A Northern California woman faces at least 30 years in prison after being convicted on 48 felony and misdemeanor charges related to alcohol-fueled parties she hosted where she pressured underage girls to have sex with boys she helped intoxicate.
Shannon Marie O’Connor, 51, known as the Los Gatos “party mom,” was found guilty Wednesday on most of the 63 charges against her at the Santa Clara County courthouse in San Jose.
Those charges were related to child endangerment and misdemeanor sexual battery, as well as two felony sex counts.
Jeff Rosen, Santa Clara County district attorney, said at a news conference Wednesday afternoon that O’Connor would face at least 30 years in prison pending aggravating factors still to be considered by a judge on March 11.
Final sentencing is set for March 26.
“After many years and many, many victims, today there was justice,” Rosen said at that news conference on the steps of the courthouse. “It was a long wait, it was a long trial. There was a lot of hardship and pain and suffering, but with the jury’s verdict today, there is now justice.”
O’Connor’s attorney Stephen Prekoski said his client was “crushed [and] very disappointed.”
“I don’t think I can say it any better than that,” he said at the news conference.
O’Connor was indicted by a grand jury in November 2023 on 20 felony and 43 misdemeanor counts.
The parties and incidents that spurred the charges took place from June 1, 2020, to May 3, 2021, according to the criminal complaint.
Prosecutors said O’Connor provided so much alcohol to her son and his friends and other partygoers, mostly ages 13 to 15, that they “would vomit, be unable to stand, and fall unconscious,” according to court documents.
O’Connor was arrested in Idaho after moving there in June 2021, according to the district attorney’s office. She was extradited to California, where she was initially charged in October 2021 with 39 counts, including 12 felonies.
Christina Hanks, a Santa Clara County sheriff’s detective, noted in a report that “extremely intoxicated” minors at events where O’Connor provided alcohol would be encouraged by the defendant to “engage in sexual activity with each other.”
Hanks described several occurrences in which the children were left in dangerous situations. A 13- to 14-year-old sober teen girl was asked to care for “an extremely intoxicated” 14-year-old boy at a summer of 2020 house party, according to court documents.
The boy passed out “covered in his own vomit” and only awoke to vomit more, court documents said. The defendant also advised against calling for an ambulance when the girl asked for one, according to the documents.
O’Connor rented a cottage in Santa Cruz for her son’s birthday in early October 2020, according to court documents, which state that she asked a group of his friends over Snapchat “what kind of alcohol they wanted.”
The drunk boys urinated on the property, threw up in the backyard and stumbled and fell on the patio,the documents state. The homeowner reported damage of $9,000.
In December 2020, O’Connor handed a drunk boy a condom and pushed him into a bed with a drunk girl, who locked herself in the bathroom out of fear, court documents state.
In another instance, O’Connor encouraged one girl to perform oral sex on a boy, while in another episode she led a drunk boy into a room with an intoxicated girl, and the male penetrated the girl with his fingers, according to the documents.
O’Connor bought vodka and Fireball whiskey, provided condoms, and discouraged the teens from telling their parents or police about the parties or calling for help when one of the victims passed out in their own vomit, prosecutors said.
In another case, she let a minor drive her sport utility vehicle in the Los Gatos High School parking lot while two other teens held on to the back; one fell off and was knocked unconscious, the district attorney said.
Prekoski, O’Connor’s attorney, said the defense had a tough battle to wage. Neither he nor his client believed all the alcohol consumed by the teens was directly provided by O’Connor, but instead could have been easily taken from her house.
Prekoski said he disagreed with the district attorney’s theory, which was essentially, “all bad, all the time, as bad as you can imagine it.”
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