The story of Shannon O'Connor, a.k.a. Shannon Bruga, that broke earlier this week, about the alleged streak of extremely boozy parties she threw over the last year for her teenage son and his friends, appears to have another chapter out of state.
It sounds like, despite being under investigation for the bizarre teen-partying she allegedly facilitated while in the Bay Area, O'Connor couldn't stop herself from continuing the parties after relocating to Idaho. O'Connor was arrested last Saturday at a home in Star, Idaho, and as the Chronicle now reports, at the time of her arrest, there were 12 teens in the home, most of whom had spent the night there, including two teenage sons. The initial report only mentioned the one son, who turned 15 last fall — and whose birthday party at a rental home in Santa Cruz resulted in $9,000 in damages.
Authorities in Ada County, Idaho say the teens' parents were contacted and they were all sent home.
It may be there's something up in O'Connor's marriage to a Bay Area tech executive, because the move to Idaho is now being reported as something more permanent than temporary. And authorities in Ada County say they had been investigating O'Connor since early this summer, regarding child endangerment and abuse claims, and their investigation was still ongoing when O'Connor's arrest was made on behalf of Santa Clara County authorities.
And it sounds like O'Connor knew she was under investigation in the Bay Area, and some parents of teenagers in Idaho found out as well — which led at least one local family to "sever their relationship" with O'Connor and report to authorities that she subsequently was "harassing them," according to Ada County sheriff’s officials.
As of last weekend, O'Connor's sons had been placed in the custody of the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare.
O'Connor stands accused of 39 criminal charges, including felony child abuse, sexual assault, and providing alcohol to minors. A court filing by the Santa Clara County district attorney’s office alleges that O'Connor threw parties both large and small for groups of 14- and 15-year-olds between June 2020 and May 2021. These parties were at the Los Gatos home she shared with husband Robert Amaral, as well as at a home in Lake Tahoe, and the rental home in Santa Cruz.
Investigators say O'Connor arranged the parties via text and Snapchat, and that she actively coerced the teenagers to drink excessive amounts and engage in sexual activity with each other, some of it non-consensual. O'Connor also allegedly would watch some of these sexual encounters, and some the teens said they did not remember the encounters afterwards. One teenage girl claimed she had been digitally penetrated without consent by a friend of O'Connor's son, and that O'Connor had allegedly laughed about this when she learned about it.
Another alleged drunken escapade involving O'Connor's SUV ended with a teen boy getting a concussion.
O'Connor remains in custody in the Ada County Jail in Idaho on a $900,000 bond, and she may soon face charges there as well.
