Exhuming Bobby Fischer

[Jonas Grumby]

LONDON – The remains of chess genius Bobby Fischer are to be exhumed to determine whether he is the father of a 9-year-old girl, a lawyer representing the child and her mother said Thursday.

Thordur Bogason, a lawyer based in the Icelandic capital of Reykjavik, said the country's Supreme Court made the decision earlier this week in order to allow for tests so his client, Jinky Young, can find out who her father is.

"At this point we are just trying to establish this," he said. "And if she is confirmed as the daughter of Bobby Fischer, then by Icelandic law she is his legal heir."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/eu_iceland_bobby_fischer

[1695814]

Chess icon Bobby Fischer's body exhumed in Iceland to determine whether he fathered girl
By GUDJON HELGASON , Associated Press
Last update: July 5, 2010 - 9:08 AM

REYKJAVIK, Iceland - Authorities in Iceland have exhumed the body of American chess champion Bobby Fischer to determine whether he is the father of a 9-year-old girl from the Philippines.

Police district commissioner Olafur Helgi Kjartansson said Fischer's corpse was dug up from a cemetery near Selfoss in southern Iceland early Monday in the presence of a doctor, a priest and other officials.

Kjartansson said the exhumation "was done in a professional and dignified way and according to law. The privacy of the deceased was protected at all times."

He said Fischer was reburied after DNA samples were taken.

Fischer died in Iceland in January 2008 aged 64. He left no will, and legal wrangling continues over his estate.
Last month Iceland's supreme court ruled Fischer should be exhumed so DNA testing could determine whether he was the father of Jinky Young, whose mother Marilyn says she had a relationship with Fischer.

Jinky, who lives in the Philippines with her mother, flew to Iceland to provide her own blood sample in December.
Fischer, who was born in Chicago and raised in Brooklyn, New York, became world famous in 1972 when he defeated Boris Spassky of the Soviet Union for the world championship in a tournament, played in Reykjavik, that brimmed with Cold War symbolism.

Fischer became an American hero, but his later life was dominated by his erratic, eccentric behavior.
He lost his world title in 1975 after refusing to defend it against Anatoly Karpov. He dropped out of competitive chess and largely out of view, spending time in Hungary and the Philippines and emerging occasionally to make outspoken and often outrageous comments, sometimes attacking the United States.

Fischer was arrested in Japan in 2004 and threatened with extradition to the U.S. to face charges of breaking international sanctions against the former Yugoslavia by playing a chess match there in 1992.

Fischer renounced his U.S. citizenship and spent nine months in custody before chess-loving Iceland granted him citizenship.

Fischer lived in Iceland from 2005 until his death and is buried about 30 miles (50 kilometers) east of the capital, Reykjavik.http://www.startribune.com/nation/97794214.html?elr=KArksLckD8EQDUoaEyqyP4O:DW3ckUiD 3aPc:_Yyc:aUac8HEaDiaMDCinchO7DU

[Jonas Grumby]

http://gambit.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/19/lawyer-raises-doubts-about-bobby-fischers-exhumation-and-paternity-results/

The Filipino lawyer for a woman who filed a paternity lawsuit claiming that Bobby Fischer, the late chess champion, was the father of her daughter, has criticized how tissue samples were obtained to perform the DNA tests. The test, which reportedly came back negative on Tuesday, was ordered by the Supreme Court of Iceland as part of a dispute over Mr. Fischer’s estate.