FRESNO (CA)
Fresno Bee
March 16, 2020
By Robert Kuwada
Jim Bartko, the former Fresno State athletics director and a survivor of childhood sexual abuse by a Catholic priest, died Monday while undergoing surgery after collapsing during a morning workout. He was 54.
Bartko, who was back at the University of Oregon in a fundraising position, had filed a lawsuit last Thursday against the Diocese of Oakland under AB 218, the California Child Victims Act and recently published a book, “Boy in the Mirror,” detailing the abuse and its impact on his personal and professional life.
Hired by Fresno State in 2014, Bartko had pushed a transformative Bulldog Stadium renovation plan, hired coach Jeff Tedford, oversaw the return of a wrestling program and addition of women’s water polo, taking on an athletics department overburdened by 21 sports programs while dealing with insomnia and anxiety issues that went back to his childhood.
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