NY judge found ‘credible evidence’ that Sen. Ron Wyden’s kids relentlessly harassed wife’s assistant before suicide: docs

A New York judge found “credible evidence” that Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden’s kids terrorized their mom’s personal assistant with “abhorrent” homophobic slurs – including “little zest bunny” – before his suicide, documents show.

Wyden’s wife and the kids’ mom, Nancy Bass Wyden — who owns the Big Apple’s famed Strand Bookstore — largely didn’t object to the accusations her former assistant, Brandon O’Brien, raised during their fight over unemployment benefits, noted the administrative-law judge in her Feb. 28 labor decision favoring O’Brien.

O’Brien, 35, ended up committing suicide in May, allegedly driven to taking his own life after working for Bass Wyden for two years, according to a wrongful-death suit filed by the worker’s widowed husband, Thomas Maltezos, against her real-estate company, citing the alleged abuse.

Months earlier, when O’Brien had attempted to collect unemployment checks after he resigned from Bass Real Estate LLC in Sept. 2024, Bass Wyden fought him on it, arguing he shouldn’t receive government assistance because he only left the job when he knew he was about to be fired for theft, court papers show.

But administrative law Judge Lorraine Ferrigno ultimately sided with O’Brien.

The lawyers for Maltezos say in their lawsuit that the ruling “affirmed” O’Brien’s hostile workplace allegations.

The administrative judge wrote that two of the Wydens’ three kids — a then-11-year-old daughter and 15-year-old son — texted O’Brien messages calling him “zesty,” which can be a homophobic slur.

The texts included such missives as “actual zest kitten” and “can you please order me food my little zest bunny.”

The teen son also referred to O’Brien as a “f–” or “f—-t” — instances that at times were witnessed by Bass Wyden, who “strongly admonished” her son, according to the judge.

Such accusations have since been mirrored in O’Brien’s widower’s lawsuit.

When O’Brien first started working for Bass Wyden, he complained to her that her daughter behaved and spoke sexually and inappropriately around him, and while the mom didn’t remember the gripe, she recalled the child’s male au pair leveling a similar complaint, the law judge’s findings state.

As the harassment dragged on, O’Brien finally received one more “homophobic” message from the son that led him to quit Sept. 30, 2024, according to court docs.

“The credible evidence establishes that [O’Brien] voluntarily separated from his employment after he received a homophobic text message from the teenage son of his boss after experiencing prior incidents with the children and nothing changed,” the ruling states.

The judge wrote that while Bass Wyden couldn’t recall some of O’Brien’s allegations, “there does not seem to be much disagreement that the employer’s children, more specifically her son, harassed [O’Brien].

“Additionally, there seems to not be a dispute that the employer found her son’s homophobic statements abhorrent and chastised him for them,” the judge wrote.

Bass Wyden attempted to counter that O’Brien only quit because he realized he was going to be fired.

She claimed that the night before he resigned, she discovered he stole from the company, including through credit-card fraud, the judge wrote.

A police report filed by Bass Wyden accused O’Brien of stealing about $650,000, but he was never arrested or charged, authorities said.

O’Brien died May 26, closing the case.

But the law judge wrote that no “testimony or evidence” shows O’Brien was aware that he was about to be fired.

The lawsuit filed by O’Brien’s widower claims Bass Wyden spread false rumors about O’Brien in a bid to keep him jobless, leaving him distraught.

An e-mailed Post request for comment from Bass Wyden’s representative and legal team about the labor decision was not returned.

A spokesperson for Bass Real Estate previously called Maletzos’s lawsuit “baseless” and “deeply misguided.”

The company’s legal team has filed a motion to toss the case.

“O’Brien was employed as a trusted personal assistant, with a range of responsibilities,” the rep said.

“His misuse of that trust, and his misrepresentation of the events that took place while in that position, further reveal the depth of his moral corruption and manipulation.”