Man who claimed he was Charlie Sheen’s assistant convicted of sick slumber party child abuse

Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? Start your Independent Membership today.

A music teacher who claimed he worked as a personal assistant to actors Charlie Sheen and Brooke Mueller was convicted Thursday of sexually assaulting two young girls after luring them into his home for twisted "slumber parties."

Jurors deliberated for just a day before finding Anthony Philip Bruccoliere guilty of 18 felony sexual assault crimes involving the two victims between 2008 and 2019. The Orange County Superior Court panel also found true sentencing enhancements for multiple victims.

Bruccoliere, who faces decades behind bars, is scheduled to be sentenced Jan. 8.

Prosecutors detailed a horrific campaign of abuse that began when the girls were children. Bruccoliere babysat the pair, molested them after swimming sessions under the guise of "playing house," and later invited them to sleepovers at his Costa Mesa home. There, he forced them to rehearse fake cover stories for their parents about watching the movie "Beetlejuice" while he subjected them to years of sexual abuse.

"We had a 200-pound guy on top of us," one victim testified, describing how the 6-foot-plus defendant used his weight to overpower the girls when they tried to resist. "We didn't think we had an option to move."

The woman testified that Bruccoliere claimed he was teaching them to "French kiss" for future boyfriends. When she was 12 years old, she testified, Bruccoliere penetrated her, leaving her bleeding.

"He said, 'Oh, sorry,'" the victim recalled on the stand.

Bruccoliere was ultimately snared by a covert police sting after the victims, then teens, confronted him in a wiretapped phone call. Jurors heard the chilling recording in which Bruccoliere chuckled when told the girls were in therapy, denied the penetration, and tried to blame the children for the abuse.

"I was just doing whatever you guys wanted to do," Bruccoliere claimed on the recording, adding: "I never instigated anything."

Police arrested Bruccoliere less than an hour after the call ended.

Defense attorney Mark Fredrick argued that while his client implicated himself on the recorded call, prosecutors failed to prove the level of force or duress required for the most serious charges, pointing to conflicting statements.

"Kids can't consent," Fredrick conceded in court, but argued Bruccoliere vigorously denied using force or penetrating the girls.

Deputy District Attorney Thomas Farnell blasted Bruccoliere's attempts to shift blame onto young children who did not even understand what was happening to them. "Bruccoliere knew he was living out his sick fantasy," Farnell told the jury.

Bruccoliere, a guitarist and music instructor, claimed on his LinkedIn profile that he served as a personal assistant to Sheen and Mueller from 2009 to 2013, and later worked as a property manager for the Netflix series "Cobra Kai" in 2019.