EXCLUSIVE: Trans-Identified Male Convicted of Killing Two Men, Feeding Bodies to Pigs, Files Complaint Seeking Retrial

A trans-identified male convicted of murdering two men and feeding their corpses to pigs has filed a legal complaint seeking a retrial, alleging that the attorney appointed to him by the state of Oregon failed to “controvert false evidence,” and that his Sixth Amendment rights have been violated. Vietnam war and US Navy veteran Susan Monica, born Steven Buchanan, was found guilty of the two murders, as well as two counts of abuse of a corpse in the first degree, and in 2015 was sentenced to a minimum of 50 years in prison.

Buchanan is currently serving his lengthy sentence at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility, a women’s prison known for having a history of abuses against female inmates. He is listed under his feminine name, Susan Monica, and is described as being “female” in official records.

In 1991, Buchanan purchased a 20-acre farm in Oregon where he would kill two handymen in 2012 and 2013 before feeding their corpses to the pigs he owned at the property.

Multiple new outlets reporting on the case referred to Buchanan simply as a “woman,” without mentioning his transgender status or the fact he is a biological male.

“You shot two people and fed them to your pigs,” Judge Timothy Barnack told Buchanan during sentencing. “I don’t know how else I can put it. You valued pigs more than you value people. It may sound harsh, but you are a cold-blooded killer.”

Now, Buchanan has filed a writ of habeas corpus demanding to be let out of prison, citing errors in the original trial. Buchanan, referring to himself as “Ms. Monica” in the complaint, alleges that “the trial court barred Ms. Monica from airing her concerns about counsel,” and that the court, which denied his motion for a substitution of counsel, “failed to honor Ms. Monica’s conditional request that if her counsel was not relieved, she be permitted to represent herself.”

In 2012, Buchanan hired 59-year-old Stephen Delicino to assist him with tasks on the farm in exchange for financial compensation and accommodations. According to Buchanan’s testimony, the two became involved in a physical altercation after Buchanan discovered that Delicino was in possession of two of his guns. During a confrontation over the alleged theft, Buchanan has claimed that a gun misfired, striking Delicino in the back of the head and killing him.

However, Buchanan’s story regarding the death of Delicino was inconsistent. He variously asserted that Delicino shot himself in the head, and that he had shot the victim in self-defense — before his remains were eaten by Buchanan’s pigs. What was left of Delicino’s corpse would later be found by investigators in plastic bags on the property.

The following year, Buchanan hired Robert Haney, 56, as a handyman by placing an advertisement for hired help. In the summer of 2013, Haney’s children became concerned when they could not contact their father, and filed a missing persons report with the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office.

In the legal filing requesting a retrial, Buchanan argues that his Sixth Amendment rights have been violated, and as such he is entitled to a retrial. Buchanan argues this on the basis that he was not allowed to properly represent himself and that he was not granted an alternative counsel when he complained about the state-appointed attorney who represented him in court, Christine Herbert.

According to Buchanan, Herbert “failed to controvert false evidence” that he had sold a shotgun to a pawn shop shortly after being contacted by investigators looking for Haney.

On May 22, 2014, Buchanan sent a request to the trial court seeking new counsel, and wrote on an inmate request form from the jail: “I need a new lawyer. Yesterday my investigator came to see me and would not talk to me until I signed a release form for mental health… I want someone to find out where Robert Haney was for the 6+ weeks he was missing before he turned up in my pig pen and prove me innocent.”

The main issue Buchanan had with his state-appointed counsel, Christine Herbert, was that “she seamed [sic] more interested in me being insane than in[n]ocent.”

In response to multiple requests from Buchanan for a change in his representation, the court denied his motion for new counsel. Jackson County Judge Timothy Barnack speculated that if he were to give Buchanan new counsel that he “may not like what they have to say, either” and would “keep asking for more and more attorneys.”

Buchanan further contests that a jailhouse informant incarcerated with him had sabotaged his case when testifying in court that he had admitted to shooting Haney after he refused to leave Buchanan’s property. While awaiting sentencing, he was held among female inmates at Jackson County jail. A former cellmate of Buchanan’s, Jordan Farris, testified in court that Buchanan had confessed to the grotesque murders.

Farris also described getting “chills” after receiving a birthday card from Buchanan signed, “from the sweetest murderer in Jackson County.”

Because the state’s attorney, Herbert, had also represented Farris, in a felony methamphetamine case, Buchanan accused his legal counsel of a “conflict of interest” and suggested that Farris had “embellished the story” in hopes of gaining a plea deal.

Monica giving an interview from Jackson County jail in 2015. Photo: KTVL 10.

While claiming to be innocent, Buchanan argues in his writ that he shot the first victim, Delicino, in self-defense after a physical altercation, and that his pigs ate the corpse afterwards. The second victim, Haney, Buchanan claims, was “close to death or already dead” when he found the man being consumed by pigs, and then “shot him out of mercy.”

Bizarrely, however, Buchanan’s filing describes how, on January 5, 2014, Deputy Donald Adams of the Jackson County Sheriff’s Department visited his farm to investigate a missing person report lodged by Haney’s son. At that time, Buchanan states he had commented on wanting “to obtain a government grant to research how pigs consume human bodies.”

Astonishingly, in his own legal complaint, Buchanan states: “While the officers were at Ms. Monica’s property they requested to look around. She asked: ‘Where’s your warrant?’ During this encounter Ms. Monica spoke of killing people and feeding them to her pigs and clarified that she was joking.”

Video footage of a 4-hour long police interrogation with Buchanan recorded on January 6, 2014, shows him presenting inconsistencies in his narrative and expressing concern for the welfare of his pigs. When asked about Haney’s death, Buchanan insisted that he happened upon his pigs already consuming Haney, while alive, and that this prompted Buchanan to fatally shoot him.

“He had been gone for over a month. I came down to feed my animals, and I heard this moaning. His guts were out, but he was still alive… I didn’t think he was going to live. I went up and got my rifle and shot him in the head… And I just left him there. You know that pigs will eat anything if you give them the opportunity,” Buchanan said.

“He was being eaten, what I believed to be, alive,” Buchanan told detectives during the interview. “I put him out of his misery. I do that for my animals and this was the first time I did it for a human being and I knew it was wrong but if it were one of my pigs suffering out there, I would have done the same thing.”

Buchanan admitted that he took the remainder of Haney’s body, including his skull, and placed it in a plastic bag in his barn. He then drew a map to direct police to his remains.

State Police forensic anthropologist Veronica Vance testified that Haney had suffered three to four gunshot wounds to the head. His legs had been chopped off with an ax, though it was unclear whether this occurred before or after Haney’s death. Additionally, his thigh bones showed signed of having been gnawed on by an animal.

It was during a polygraph portion of the interrogation when Buchanan slipped up and told an officer he “left them,” which ultimately led to the discovery of Delicino’s body. While drawing up a map of the farm, Buchanan confessed, “Right there, about three feet down, there’s part of another body.”

Police located the remains of the two victims on Buchanan’s property in the locations he had provided during the interrogation. Investigators excavated large portions of his property, but no other human remains were discovered.

Buchanan told police that Delicino had attempted to steal a gun from his farm, and that an argument broke out after he confronted the handyman about the theft. He claimed Delicino then committed suicide by shooting himself in the head multiple times, while running outside and falling into a pig pen.

“He grabbed a little pistol and he said that he [didn’t] want to go back to jail, and he decided he was going to kill himself. He shot himself in the head, and then he ran out. That was when it got even worse… and he emptied the gun in his own head,” Buchanan told law enforcement.

“Do you think I believe your story?” an officer asked Buchanan.

“No. I don’t believe my story… It’s too stupid,” Buchanan said.

During the interrogation, Buchanan admitted, “I do not value human life very much… My feeling is the only thing wrong with the planet is there’s people on it. If not for us, all the other animals, even dodo birds, would be here.”

On January 13, 2014, lead investigator Detective Eric Henderson again interrogated Buchanan, at which point the pig farmer’s story regarding Delicino’s death drastically changed. In the new narrative, Buchanan shot Delicino multiple times in self-defense after the hired handyman allegedly attempted to kill him.

Vietnam veteran Steven Buchanan at his farm in Oregon. Buchanan now claims to be a woman and calls himself Susan Monica.

In Buchanan’s revised explanation, Delicino had stolen a rifle from him worth approximately $300. Some time later, Delicino announced he would be leaving the farm. In a 2022 podcast interview, Buchanan said, “I had tried several times to get him to stay where he was and move in with me.”

The two then allegedly began to argue over “who he had sold the rifle to,” leading Delicino to “go nuts,” according to Buchanan.

“He thought I was going to have him arrested for stealing. I didn’t know it at the time, but he had hit me so hard with the butt of a rifle that he busted my right breast implant.”

Buchanan claims that Delicino attempted to kill him, and it was then that he shot him in the head. He continued to shoot Delicino, he said, because of “this thing called death grip.”

“When he didn’t let go, I went ahead and I shot him a couple more times,” Buchanan said. “I couldn’t believe it, but he was still holding onto my leg really tight. And I didn’t know it at the time, but I’m pretty smart, but you know, nobody knows everything. So I’ve learned that as I had heard about this thing called death grip… after some time, I realized that he was dead after the first shot.”

Detective Henderson, who directed the investigation, told the court during trial that Buchanan had admitted to killing over a dozen victims in a similar manner. “She told me that if she told me about the 17 others that she would spend the rest of her life in jail,” said Detective Henderson, referring to Buchanan as a woman.

During the 2015 court proceedings, Buchanan insisted on cross-examining witnesses, including Detective Henderson. While questioning the lead investigator, KOBI-TV NBC5 reported that Buchanan threatened to kill Henderson and feed him to his pigs. He then attempted to pass off the remarks as a joke.

Buchanan has a documented tendency to lash out with similarly dark “jokes.” During the January 6 police interview, Buchanan angrily responded to Eric Fox, the Deputy Medical Examiner, after being asked the whereabouts of a former tenant.

“So you know he still exists and he hasn’t disappeared, he’s not deceased on your property?” Fox asked.

Buchanan snarled and leaned in as though about to strike Fox, and said, “Well, you’ll have to find him, won’t ya?” He then chuckled awkwardly and blamed his “stupid sense of humor.” During a separate interview, Buchanan quietly remarked, “I see my stupid sense of humor become a reality.”

The former tenant, who lived at Buchanan’s property for four years, would go on to tell local news that the farmer killed his cat and two dogs, and that he believed he had fed them to his pigs.

It is unclear how many men claiming a transgender status are currently being held in women’s facilities in Oregon state. As Reduxx previously reported, a man in custody for the brutal murder of his ex-girlfriend had been briefly transferred to the Coffee Creek Women’s Correctional Facility, but was quickly moved back to the male estate just weeks later for unknown reasons.

Zera Lola Zombie, born Daniel Lee Smith, has received a “vulnerable” designation by an Oregon Court, entitling him to special protections and privileges due to his gender identity. He is classified as a “female” inmate in the Oregon inmate directory.

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