The remains of the 73-year-old singer – who died on Christmas Day 2006 of a suspected heart attack — were being held at his daughter Deanna’s house in South Carolina while a public mausoleum is being prepared.

However, LaRhonda Pettit claims the Brown’s body has since disappeared — she believes in an effort to prevent her carrying out an autopsy to determine the true cause of her father’s death. The 48-year-old is convinced the “Sex Machine” singer was actually killed by greedy pals after his fortune.

“My daddy’s body has disappeared. I have no clue where it was taken, but I need to know where. I’m convinced his death was suspicious and I want the people responsible brought to justice. The only way to do that is to exhume his body and have an autopsy. I cannot understand why one was never conducted.”

BISHOP DON MAGIC JUAN has confirmed he’s dating JAMES BROWN’s widow-Tomi Rae Brown.

He says, “She says I’m the only one to make her cry and smile at the same time.”

Magic Juan admits the couple has been keeping their romance low-key because hew lawyers feared a relationship with a former hustler would not help her case in court.

“They won’t let us have it that way, and I understand.” Meanwhile, Brown admits she’s close to the Bishop but she has no plans to wed him. She explains, “I gave him a ring, but it was just a gift. As far as I’m concerned, I’m the Godmother of Soul and I have no intentions of being with anybody else.”

A seventy-three year-old Georgia woman claims in court papers that she married James Brown in 1953 and they never divorced.

Attorney David Bell said Velma Warren Brown claims the late soul singer never served her with divorce papers.

She has filed court papers in South Carolina saying the couple had three children and lived together for 17 years. He also said they saw each other in December, just weeks before Brown died in a Georgia hospital. He was 73.

One of Brown’s former backup singers, Tomi Rae Hynie, has claimed she is Brown’s fourth wife.

LaRhonda Pettit is a divorced mother of two; and she’s claiming to be the late Godfather of Soul’s secret love child.

According to gossip rag The Globe, LaRhonda is the ‘spitting image of ‘father’ James Brown and claims she met him briefly in Texas in 2003-at which time he refused to acknowledge her.

She claims she underwent a DNA test to find out once and for all if James Brown is her father; she says the test proved to a 99.9999% accuracy that she is J.B’s baby.

“I look like my daddy, I walk like my daddy, I talk like my daddy. I even have bow legs just like my daddy. That’s because I’m James Brown’s eldest daughter. “I’m just heartbroken he isn’t alive to hear me tell him.” Pettit now hopes to be embraced by the rest of Brown’s family, but admits, “I’ve tried to reach them, but they’re not answering my calls.” The disabled former flight attendant is also hoping for a windfall inheritance from her late father, so she can launch a new charity aimed at helping others find their real parents through DNA testing. She adds, “I’m going to call it Children Under The Stars. I want to help people so they don’t have to endure the same heartache I’ve had to endure.”

The family of James Brown and the appointed trustees are now bickering over who is responsible for the deceased soul legend’s $70,000 funeral.

The C.A. Reid Funeral Home in Augusta, Georgia arranged the funeral and cared for his body from his December 25 death up until its March burial at Brown’s daughter Deanna Brown Thomas’s home in Beech Island.

Charles Reid, manager of the funeral home, says: “I’m just waiting on them to get some of this mess straightened out. I really haven’t pushed the issue, even though I’d like to have my money.”

Buddy Dallas, Brown’s adviser and trustee of his estate, says that James’ kids need to pony up the dough for his funeral:

“It was the children that ran up a funeral bill of over $150,000, not the trustees. We’ve done our very best to do what we could to accommodate the creditors. There’s no great big pile of money or surplus of money just lying around. The trustees and the personal representatives are certainly not going to do anything – as much scrutiny as this has been given – improper, inappropriate and certainly not illegal.”

Soul legend James Brown’s longtime valet Roosevelt Johnson has approached the National Enqurier with the tale that J.B’s alleged widow, and the mother of his five year old son James III, Tomi Rae Hynie is a lesbian.

R.J says that J.B nixed Tomi Rae’s name from his will after he found out that she was having sex with one of his other female backup singers Candice Hurst:

“James died of a broken heart… People in James’ entourage knew there was something going on between Tomi Rae and Candice. I even saw them kiss on the lips in a dressing room…..He (Brown) told me: `She wants me to remarry her. I never will. She’s a lesbian. And I’m cutting her out of my will, too.”

Candice Hurst has copped to being a lesbian-she even admits sharing a bed with Tomi Rae on at least one ocassion-but “nothing happened,” the singer says.

Tomi Rae denies any claims that she goes both ways, the former backup singer says Candice “introduced me to my husband and that’s as far as it went.”

A South Carolina court granted Tomi permission on Friday to re-enter the mansion she shared with the Godfather of Soul with the purpose of retrieving some personal items.

Tomi Rae Hynie, the alleged widow of soul legend James Brown, has sued the singer’s estate. The former backup singer claims that she is entitled to a portion of J.B’s assets despite the fact that serious questions remain about whether or not the couple were legally married.

Attorneys for James Brown claim that T. Rae was still married to her first husband in Texas when she wed the Godfather at his South Carolina estate in 2001.

“I have a long hard battle to fight for my husband’s rights, for my rights and for my son’s rights that have been completely violated during this time,” Tomi told the Associated Press. “I am his wife. It’s my home.”

Tomi Rae was not mentioned in the will that was read last month to the singer’s six adult children-neither was the five year old son that she claims to share with the Make It Funky singer.

The Brown children filed suit against the trustees of their father’s estate late last month.