final credits - e. pierce marshall
James Howard Marshall II was a wealthy American oil business executive.
On June 27th, 1994 he married Anna Nicole Smith, Playboy Playmate (36DD-26-38) and topless dancer. She was 26; he was 89.
Marshall died August 4th, 1995.
Presumably he died of natural causes, but talk-show host David Letterman surmised Marshall's death came about due to "exploratory drilling."
A bitter legal battle over Marshall's estate erupted between Smith and Marshall's son, E. Pierce Marshall.
E. Pierce Marshall, James Howard Marshall II, Anna Nicole Smith
At one point Smith stood to inherit $449,754,134. That sum was later reduced to $88,000,000 and more recently to zero.
Smith claimed that her stepson had schemed and forged documents to deprive her of the huge gift her octogenarian husband had promised her before his death.
In May, 2006 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Smith deserved another day in court.
E. Pierce Marshall died unexpectedly on June 20th, 2006 from a brief and extremely aggressive infection. He was 67.
In a statement read to the press "The family would politely request that their privacy be respected during this extremely difficult time as they grapple with this devastating loss."
A native of Dallas, Texas, E. Pierce Marshall managed his family's extensive business holdings. He served on the board of Koch Industries Inc., a commodities conglomerate based in Wichita, Kansas that operates refineries and pipelines, trades commodities and manufactures pulp, paper and fibres.
While privacy had been requested at this time of loss, the family and E. Pierce Marshall certainly had no problem with holding Smith up to public ridicule whenever it suited their purposes.
It was not immediately clear what Marshall's death would do to Smith's legal efforts to gain part of the estate.
Other tributes to relatives of the famous can be found here.