A 47-year-old Star woman accused of throwing parties for young teenagers filled with alcohol and sex in California is now being held in the Ada County Jail — and detectives are concerned she may have been holding similar parties here.
Star Police arrested Shannon Bruga at her home on Wyatt Earp Drive early Saturday afternoon on a Santa Clara County arrest warrant for 39 criminal charges, including sexual battery and child endangerment. Bruga is being held in the Ada County Jail on a $900,000 bond.
Bruga is accused of throwing multiple “drunken parties for young teenagers (mostly between the ages of 14 and 15), where she encouraged sex acts, sometimes non-consensual, and sometimes while she watched,” from 2020 to earlier this year, according to Santa Clara Prosecutor’s Office reports.
Bruga is also accused of buying teens vodka and other alcohol, providing condoms, and discouraging them from telling their parents about the parties.
Check out https://bit.ly/3vdVBOk for more info about the California charges.
Ada County Sheriff’s detectives began their investigation earlier this summer after hearing from a local family Bruga was considering relocating to Treasure Valley. That family originally connected with Bruga over the internet and later met her in the Boise area earlier this spring when Bruga started looking for a home in Idaho.
That family later found out about the parties and sexual abuse investigation in California and tried to sever their relationship with Bruga. They told detectives that’s when Bruga started harassing them.
The investigation was still going on when Santa Clara prosecutors issued the arrest warrant for Bruga on Thursday. When ACSO detectives went to Bruga’s house to arrest her on Saturday afternoon, there were 10 underage boys and two girls at her home – most of whom spent the night there.
Detectives contacted the parents of those teens and later released them. Deputies declared Bruga’s two teenage sons to be in imminent danger and placed them in the custody of the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare.
Our investigators suspect Bruga held other parties with local teenagers over the last several months. Anyone with information should call (208) 577-3704 or send an email to [email protected]