Prince Frederic von Anhalt, the husband of Zsa Zsa Gabor, said Monday he plans to file a paternity challenge in court this week to gain custody of Anna Nicole Smith's infant daughter.
"I'm going to make the DNA test," he told The Associated Press in a phone interview. "If the court rules in my favor, I will go to the Bahamas and pick up the child."
Smith's companion Howard K. Stern is listed on the infant's birth certificate as the father, but former Smith boyfriend Larry Birkhead is waging a legal challenge also claiming he is the father.
Alexander Denk, who had worked as a bodyguard for Smith, told the television newsmagazine “Extra” that he had an affair with Smith, and that it’s possible he is the father.
Von Anhalt told the AP last week that he had a decade-long affair with Smith. He said he is more likely to be the father than either Stern or Birkhead because he was with Smith during the period when the child was conceived.
Von Anhalt said he was meeting today with attorney Gloria Allred to see if she will take his case. Allred declined comment.
Von Anhalt, 59, and Gabor, 90, have been married for more than 20 years. The news of her husband's alleged affair has deeply upset Gabor, according to Von Anhalt.
"She says, of course, if you bring a baby home then it's over," he said. "If my wife wants to divorce me then it's up to her. She definitely doesn't want a child in the house."
Even so, Von Anhalt said he plans to pursue the legal case.
Von Anhalt's royal credentials have been the cause of speculation over the years. He was born Robert Lichtenberg, the son of a German policeman, and bought his title after being adopted as an adult by a bankrupt daughter-in-law of the last Kaiser, according to published reports.
Gabor's attorney Ronald Jason Palmieri could not immediately be reached for comment.
Gabor, a one-time sex symbol and star of such 1950s films as "Moulin Rouge" and "Queen of Outer Space," has been in declining health in recent years and suffered a stroke in 2005. She was partially paralyzed in a car crash in 2002.
Von Anhalt, who is Gabor's eighth husband, said he and Smith met in the 1990s when Smith was still married to elderly oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall II.
Marshall introduced Smith, a fan of Gabor, to the royal celebrity couple.
Von Anhalt and Smith began their affair after Marshall's death, he said.