Susan Monica's property seemed eerie to others — especially because she allegedly said at one point 17 bodies were buried there.
Monica was born Steven Buchanan in California in 1948. She served in the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam War. Following an honorable discharge, she began living as a woman.
“She got into an engineering career and was very successful,” former Jackson County Sheriff’s Detective Eric Henderson told “Snapped,” airing Sundays at 6/5c on Oxygen.
In 1991, Monica bought a 20-acre farm in rural Wimer, Oregon. She had a herd of pigs, raised chickens, and ran a wrought-iron fence and gate-building business named White Queen Construction.
When Monica first bought her property, it was undeveloped woodlands. She erected a large barn and started work on a house. In 2013, she hired Robert Haney. “He was her handyman, laborer, carpenter. Whatever she asked of him, he did,” former employee Sean Leimanis told “Snapped.”
Robert had found Monica through an ad on Craigslist.
“My dad and Susan Monica had a deal. My dad would get part cash and be able to stay on the property. My dad agreed to build a house from the bottom up,” son Jesse Haney explained to producers.
Jesse said his father enjoyed the peace and quiet of living alone out in the woods. However, things got a little too quiet in December 2013.
“We hadn’t seen or heard from my dad for two months. We just all started to panic,” Jesse told producers.
On Jan. 1, 2014, the Haney kids drove out to check on their dad. They spoke to Monica, who claimed she hadn't seen him since he quit four months earlier.
“Susan Monica said that my dad just basically left. She wanted us to come retrieve our dad’s stuff,” Jesse told producers.
But when they saw his trailer, the Haneys knew something was wrong.
“His leather jacket was there. His dog was still running around and all his tools were there,” Jesse. said “It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.”
The Haneys filed a missing persons report with the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office. They learned months had passed since anyone had seen Robert and he had lived on cash, all of which made it difficult to track his movements.
Detectives drove out to Monica’s property to ask her about Robert’s disappearance.
The property was cluttered with vehicles, debris and makeshift structures. “I’m thinking to myself as we’re pulling up, ‘Are we in The Twilight Zone here?’" Henderson recalled.
Monica told them Robert had lived and worked on her property for six months but took a bad turn in the fall.
“He received a concerning phone call from a family member that she had been the victim of assault and he was really upset about that,” she had said, Henderson told producers.
Monica claimed Robert then began drinking heavily and acting erratically. She said he eventually told her he was going away for awhile and asked her to take care of his dog.
Authorities were able to track Robert's Oregon Trail Electronics Benefit Transfer card. They learned it had last been used in December 2013 at a Walmart in Grants Pass, Oregon, about a 25-minute drive from Monica’s property.
“It had been used at a date after Susan Monica said that he had disappeared,” Jackson County Deputy District Attorney Allan Smith told producers.
Detectives then reviewed security camera footage — which showed Monica using Robert’s EBT card.
“That’s when I was like, ‘OK, we got something else going on here,'" Henderson said. “I was really concerned that there was some foul play involved.”
Law enforcement officers executed a search warrant on Monica’s property. Officers were taken aback by the squalor, which included piles of garbage, rotting food, and industrial waste.
“I would describe that property as eerie. There was a very strong order there, a lot of decay,” former Jackson County Sheriff’s Detective Julie Denney told “Snapped.”
