Shock of the Century: Jury Finds O.J. Simpson Not Guilty

By Art Harris, (c) www.artharris.com, all rights reserved

We expect the new publisher if O.J. Simpson’s cancelled “If I Did It,” to change the book’s name to something like, “She Made Me Do It,” a cold confessional that blames his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, for pushing him over the edge to commit the double rage murders that left her and Ron Goldman lifeless in a pool of blood on the back steps of her Bundy house in 1994.

I recall a witness saying he spied an O.J.-like figure lurking in the shadows as Nicole embraced her younger lover. Then, according to investigators I interviewed covering the trial, they believe Simpson confronted her, Goldman bravely stepped up and O.J’s swing blade did the rest.

If Beaufort Books can repackage and reposition “If I Did It,” earlier perceived as a shameless attempt for Simpson to profit from his unspeakable crime, into O.J.’s True Confessions, it just might become a bestseller, and start paying off part of $38 million wrongful death judgment the Goldman’s won in a civil suit.

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By Art Harris (c), www.artharris.com, all rights reserved

Check out the article by Quincy Parker in the Bahamas Journal today, asking whether developer G. Ben Thompson will show up for the August 28 Supreme Court hearing on a contempt charge for allegedly violating court injunctions protecting Anna Nicole Smith and Howard K. Stern, when they were living in the Horizons home. As we reported Friday, GBT and his lawyer could be jailed if found guilty. Read the rest of this entry »

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South Carolina developer G. Ben Thompson Gets New Court Date

By Art Harris, (c), www.artharris.com, all rights reserved

A South Carolina developer who briefly dated Anna Nicole Smith Friday failed to appear in a Bahamas courtrom to face contempt charges and possible jail time stemming from the Horizon’s break-in the day after the Playboy centerfold died.

G. Ben Thompson was granted a new hearing date of August 28, claiming in an affidavit made exclusively available to The Bald Truth that “the reason I will not be attending the hearing is due to allegations and threats made against me.”

In an exclusive interview with me later, his lawyer, Godfrey Pro Pinder, also charged with contempt for his role in Horizons eviction attempts that allegedly violated court orders, declined to detail the so-called threats. He said they would be spelled out when his client appears later this month.

Earlier he told me they’d come “from the other side,” but stopped short of naming estate executor Howard K. Stern, who called any such innuendo “ridiculous.

“If what Ben is trying to say is that I threatened him physically, or anyone on my behalf, with any harm, that’s an absolute lie,” Stern told me Friday. “I only communicate with Ben Thompson through my attorneys, who are ethical.”

(See us at www.etonline.com/celebrities/news/49397/index.html).

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By Art Harris, (c) www.artharris.com, all rights reserved

In another Bald Truth exclusive, we’ve learned S.C. developer G. Ben Thompson won’t be coming to the Bahamas Friday to face contempt charges and possible jail time stemming from the Horizon’s break-in.

“He’s afraid for his personal safety,” his attorney, Godfrey Pro Pinder told me in an exclusive interview Thursday evening. “Threats have been made against him. I’ll be giving the judge an affidavit with the details.”

Asked who made the threats, all Pinder would say is “they’re from the other side.”

“That’s an absolute, outrageous lie,” Howard K. Stern responded, “and I’ll take the stand to say that under oath.”

(see www.etonline.com/celebrities/news/49367/index.html) Read the rest of this entry »

By Art Harris, (c), www.artharris.com,. all rights reserved

In a world wide web exclusive,The Bald Truth has learned a South Carolina developer confided to Larry Birkhead he’s yet to return all of Anna Nicole Smith’s personal property he took from Horizons the day after she died.

Birkhead tells me in an exclusive interview that he doesn’t understand why Ford Shelley is holding onto the items and that he wants everything returned asap because “it now belongs to Dannielynn.”

“A laundry list of things like birth certificates, the baby’s first footprints, personal photos, priceless things we need so she can know her mother,” Birkhead told me by the phone from Kentucky, where he was tucking Dannielynn into bed after attending an uncle’s funeral.

In mid-May, he says Shelley flew to Kentucky to personally drop off a videotape of Anna with baby Dannielynn hours after she was born, along with seven paintings Anna had done for the nursery, and three pairs of her designer sunglasses.

That’s when he says Shelley confided he had more.

“He told me there were more things I’d get later,” Birkhead told me Wednesday night, “that were in safe-keeping with a family member.”

Publically, Shelley has said he went into the house the day after Smith died in February, at her request, to rescue—and safeguard–personal items she didn’t want falling into the wrong hands.

Within days, personal photos and videos began appearing in the media, and now executor Howard K. Stern filed a burglary report in the Bahamas. Shelley then turned over her laptop, harddrives and a number of dvds to the Horry County Sheriff in Myrtle Beach, S.C., where he develops real estate with father in law G. Ben Thompson. The sheriff passed it on to Florida police looking into the Playboy centerfold’s death at the Hardrock Casino Hotel.

Shelley could not be reached for comment about the new Horizon details Birkhead told me.

Meanwhile, the Horizon’s break-in will also be centerstage at the Supreme Court in the Bahamas on Friday, when Howard K. Stern will be waiting to see if G. Ben Thompson, and his lawyer, Godfrey Pro Pinder, show up to face contempt charges and possible jail time stemming from the Horizon’s break-in.

(Also see www.etonline.com and www.theinsideronline.com that picked up our story)>

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By Art Harris, (c) www.artharris.com, all rights reserved

Howard K. Stern has shut down a Texas plastic surgeon’s attempt to sell shocking videos of the 1994 breast surgery he performed on the late Anna Nicole Smith, according to court documents.

On August 3, Stern won a crucial legal battle as executor of Smith’s estate when a California judge granted a restraining order against Dr. Gerald Wayne Johnson and ordered him to surrender surgery tapes.

In a worldwide web exclusive, The Bald Truth broke the story of the retired surgeon on July 9, when we reported Johnson been shopping the tapes via a Hollywood agent, Thomas Riccio, who edited them into a five minute pitch reel of Smith, naked, unconscious and bleeding, and scored to the soundtrack of Jaws.

According to court documents we posted on July 9, Riccio played the tape for Larry Birkhead, who said he was sickened by the trash production, including camera work showing Smith’s genitals, and a voice over from her Trim Spa ad, cooing, “Do You Like My Body?”

As estate executor, Stern declared war on Johnson, and sources tell us Riccio surrendered the tapes in his possession. New documents first posted today by celebtv.com show dubious dealings between the shock doc and Riccio. (see links on the next page). Read the rest of this entry »

By Art Harris, (c))www.artharris.com, all rights reserved

Shortly before Christmas last year, Larry Birkhead felt helpless.

Desperate to prove he was the father of baby Dannielynn, he needed to press his complex court battle from California to the Carribean, but says he didn’t know where he’d get the money to pay his lawyer’s skyrocketing legal bills to win custody of the daughter his gut told him he’d conceived with Anna Nicole Smith.

But Debra Opri had a heart, reassured him media deals would happen. Not only that, she saw he was so fragile and depressed, she ordered her law clerk, Alex Palabrica, to hold off slapping the client with the bad news—a $300,000 legal bill that would soon more than double –until after the holidays.

Then in mid-January, “Birkhead came to Opri’s office,” says Palabrica in a sworn declaration we’ve obtained exclusively, along with Birkhead’s corrections to that version of events filed July 12 in Los Angeles. If you read it, you’ll see Birkhead draws lines through what he disputes, and there’s one startling episode he does not alter.

As he reviewed Opri’s bill, Larry burst into tears. July 9 Birkhead Objection to Alex P Read the rest of this entry »