CROWN POINT, Ind. — Court documents released Thursday detail the gruesome murder of a woman from Gary, Indiana.

James McGhee, 38, of Gary, has been charged with murder in the death of Sidne-Nichole Buchanan, 27.

McGhee is being held without bail.

According to court documents, a friend of McGhee’s, who was given immunity for cooperating with the investigation, told authorities that he heard McGhee say “he lost it” and also showed him a picture of a woman believed to be Buchanan. McGhee reportedly told the friend “I beat her up bad. This is when she was living.”

On July 27th, McGhee and Buchanan had gone to a concert in Tinley Park. She never made it home.

The friend told investigators, the day after the concert, McGhee wanted him to help him clean up his Gary apartment. When he went inside, he saw the place in disarray, blood on mattresses and what appeared to be the body of a person concealed in black plastic bags. The friend went with McGee to dump the body
in the Thornton Lansing Road Nature Preserve and he took investigators to that location where Buchanan’s remains were recovered this week.

McGhee received three years of probation in a plea deal after he was accused in 2017 of kicking and punching his girlfriend who was pregnant with quadruplets. She lost three of the babies. He was also later charged with kidnapping the woman, but the attorney who represented him says the kidnapping charge was dropped.

McGhee was taken into custody Wednesday evening on 80/94 in Hammond, Ind.

“He was en route to turn himself in,” His attorney Jamise Perkins said. “He will be exonerated.”

Buchanan’s friends and family are demanding justice for her and said in a statement earlier this week she was a “dynamic person and loved by many.”
Investigators said further tests are needed to determine the cause and manner of her death.

McGhee will have his first court appearance Friday.