The turbulent life of Anna Nicole Smith, former Playboy Playmate of the Year, ex-Guess model, B-movie starlet and fodder for celebrity tabloid television, came to a shocking end on Thursday, February 8. Smith, 39, was found unconscious on the floor of her South Florida room at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino by a hotel employee late in the morning. After her bodyguard performed CPR and failed to resuscitate Smith, she was taken to Memorial Regional Hospital where doctors pronounced her dead. Her death comes five months after the passing of Daniel, Smith’s 20-year-old son, who died five days after she gave birth to a daughter, Dannielynn.

Born Vickie Lynn Hogan, the curvaceous blonde blombshell catapulted to fame in 1992 as a centerfold in “Playboy”. After winning the coveted Playmate of the Year title in 1993, Smith turned her Marilyn Monroe looks into a lucrative modeling contract for Guess Jeans and appeared in several movies such as “The Naked Gun 33 1/3” and “The Hudsucker Proxy“. The following year she created scandalous headlines across supermarket magazine racks by marrying an E. Howard Marshall II, an 89-year-old billionaire whom she met while dancing in a Texas strip club. After her husband’s passing in 1995 Smith became broiled in a fierce lawsuit with Marshall’s heirs over her $400 million dollar widow’s inheritance. The lawsuit eventually wound its way to the steps of the Supreme Court where, in 2006, Smith emerged victorious.

In the first half of the decade Smith was also the subject of a popular reality television show for E! Entertainment Television and a spokesperson for the weight loss product TrimSpa. After making several bizarre appearances on live television award programs Smith became the butt of numerous jokes on late-night talk shows and subject to speculation that she was addicted to prescription pills, alcohol or drugs, all of which were denied by the starlet. Her sudden marriage to her lawyer, Howard K. Stern, a court order to determine the paternity of her infant daughter and her involvement in a lawsuit filed against TrimSpa further propelled Smith into the limelight of celebrity gossip.

As plans for an autopsy are made, speculation runs rampant as to what caused Anna Nicole Smith’s death, where her husband was at the time and what will happen to 5-month-old daughter Dannielynn. “I am very saddened to learn about Anna Nicole’s passing,” said Playboy founder Hugh Hefner in a release issued by his company later in the day. “She was a dear friend who meant a great deal to the Playboy family and to me personally.”