DENVER—Authorities say the man who managed Sen. John McCain’s presidential-campaign office in Pueblo is in custody on suspicion of molesting young boys.
Jeffrey Claude Bartleson, 52, was arrested Wednesday on two warrants, each for sexual assault on a child by someone in a position of trust, said Sgt. Brett Wilson, with the special victim’s unit of the Pueblo Police Department.
Each charge carries a $150,000 bond, Wilson said. He didn’t know if Bartleson had an attorney.
Bartleson, of Pueblo, was arrested last week on the same charge but had bonded out. Authorities say he was re-arrested Wednesday after a campaign worker in the McCain office told police she believed Bartleson molested her 5-year-old son in October.
Court records say Bartleson offered to let the boy spend the night at his house so the boy’s mother could attend a Sarah Palin rally in Colorado Springs. The woman agreed. Court records say Bartleson molested the boy twice that night.
A police affidavit says another alleged victim also reported being molested by Bartleson when he stayed at the man’s home. The young man told police that Bartleson “said if I told anybody, he’d hurt me.”
Pueblo detective Dustin Taylor said the young man’s story “matches the modus operandi described by other victims coming out against Bartleson.”
Wilson said Thursday there are “several active investigations” involving Bartleson, and two detectives have been assigned to the case.
