A mother in Silicon Valley has been accused of hosting alcohol-fuelled sex parties for her son and his pals so she could “facilitate and watch” them perform sex acts.
The suspect faces 39 criminal counts and it is also alleged that not all of the sex acts were consensual.
The suspect has been named by police as Shannon Marie O’Connor, from Los Gatos, which is located in the affluent Santa Clara County, which is located in the San Francisco Bay Area and is home to Silicon Valley.
The 47-year-old blonde has been charged with “39 criminal counts”, which include sexual assault, felony child abuse, and providing alcohol to minors, according to a criminal complaint that was filed with the Santa Clara County Superior Court.
According to the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s office, in a statement published on their website on 12th October 2021, the “middle-aged Los Gatos woman threw drunken parties for young teenagers where she encouraged sex acts, sometimes non-consensual, and sometimes while she watched”.
The suspect, who the statement now says lives in the plush Boise suburb of Eagle in Idaho, which boasts golf courses and spas as well as numerous hiking trails and outdoor activities, allegedly “bought vodka and Fireball whiskey, provided condoms, and discouraged the teens from telling their parents about the parties or calling for help when one of them passed out in their own vomit.”
It also said that “the teens at these parties were mostly 14- and 15-years old.”
The statement added: “O’Connor, also known as Shannon Bruga, is being extradited and will be arraigned at a later date. She is charged with 39 criminal counts, including felony child abuse, sexual assault, and providing alcohol to minors. She faces incarceration if she is convicted.”
Santa Clara District Attorney Jeff Rosen said: “As a parent, I’m shocked. As the DA, I’m determined to hold those adults who endanger children fully accountable to the law and our community.”
The suspect is also facing a charge related to felony fraud after she allegedly charged over USD 120,000 (GBP 88,000) to a company card that she had been given because she was an administrative assistant at Aruba Networks.
Aruba Networks is a wireless networking company that is a subsidiary of Hewlett-Packard. It has over 6000 employees and was worth over USD 3 billion (GBP 2.2 billion) in 2019.
The statement from the District Attorney’s office also says that these “house parties” lasted from 2020 to “earlier this year”, with the suspect warning the teens “not to disclose the parties or she could go to jail.”
The statement also said: “At one party at her home, O’Connor handed an underaged teenager a condom and pushed him into a room with an intoxicated minor. During a New Year’s Eve party at her home with about five 14-year-olds, the defendant watched and laughed as a drunk teen sexually battered a young girl in bed. In another case, the defendant brought one drunk teen into a bedroom at her home where an intoxicated 14-year-old girl was lying in the bed.
“After she was assaulted, the girl said to the defendant ‘why did you leave me in there with him? Like why did you like do that? Like you knew like what he was going to do me’.
“In some cases, O’Connor would Snapchat or text teens to leave their homes in the middle of the night and drink at her house. She would provide the alcohol.
“In another case, she let a minor drive her SUV in the Los Gatos High School parking lot while two other teens held on to the back. One fell off and was knocked unconscious.”
In California, a charge of felony child abuse alone can fetch a defendant up to six years in prison, plus four more years if they have a prior felony child abuse conviction.
