She felt safe because he was a doctor. Now, she’s turning to the civil legal system for justice after she alleges her date with the optometrist in 2021 turned bloody.
“This has affected my whole life,” Victoria Hursh said. “It’s slowly eroded away at friendships and relationships … and that’s why I need to do something. I don’t think it’s fair to absorb all of it and just move on.”
Hursh filed a lawsuit against Bardash in Arapahoe County District Court on Dec. 30, alleging that the optometrist drugged and assaulted her on a date in October 2021. The lawsuit, which Hursh pursued after the 18th Judicial District Attorney’s Office declined to file criminal charges, seeks relief on claims of sexual battery, extreme and outrageous conduct and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
“Dr. Bardash denies the allegations in the lawsuit,” Michael Milstein, one of Bardash’s attorneys and a partner at Foster Graham Milstein & Calisher, said in an emailed statement to The Denver Post. “The evidence that will be presented at trial in the civil case will show that Dr. Bardash is being falsely accused of wrongdoing.”
Milstein did not elaborate on what that evidence included.
Hursh met John Bardash of Aurora, an eye doctor practicing in Denver, when her coworker set the two up in 2021. Hursh and Bardash texted back and forth for a month, and then met for drinks before going back to the optometrist’s apartment, where he made her another drink, according to the lawsuit.
She felt safe because she believed that, as a doctor, Bardash must have had background checks to obtain and maintain his license, Hursh said. The two had consensual sex, but it hurt, and Hursh told Bardash she didn’t want to do it again, according to the lawsuit. She decided to stay the night to sleep off the drinks, Hursh said.
“I woke up the next day and my body was covered in bruises and blood,” Hursh said. She found improvised restraints made from belts and neck ties on the bed and stairs, the lawsuit alleged.
Waking up was “horrifying” because her memory was blank and there was nothing to fill in the gaps, nothing to explain how she went from a perfectly normal date to bruised and bloody, she said. Hursh believes Bardash drugged her and repeatedly assaulted her while unconscious, according to the lawsuit.
“I didn’t quite register what was happening,” Hursh said. “I was very confused, really unsure of how one time of sex could lead to so much damage to my body, and it was clear from the condition of my body that it would be nothing I would ever consent to.”
Bardash told Hursh that they had sex several times throughout the night, including anal and outdoor sex, and admitted to tying her up, the civil lawsuit alleges.
Hursh stayed at Bardash’s house for several hours the morning after their date, trying to clear her head, she said. During that time, Bardash repeatedly tried to initiate sex, get her to drink more alcohol and wouldn’t let her leave until she kissed him, according to the lawsuit.
“I was really foggy for a couple of days,” Hursh said. “Some friends from work helped me piece things together as we talked it out and looked at my body.”
Victoria Hursh poses for a photo at Great Lawn Park in Denver, Colorado on Feb. 02, 2026. (Photo by RJ Sangosti/The Denver Post)When she was still bleeding the next week, Hursh decided she needed emergency medical care, the lawsuit stated.
The Arapahoe County District Attorney’s Office declined to file charges against Bardash in 2025 after reviewing the available evidence from the four-year-old incident, spokesperson Eric Ross said.
“We determined that the evidence did not meet the legal standard required to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt to a jury,” Ross said in a statement. “Ethically, prosecutors cannot move forward with a case when there is not a reasonable likelihood of a conviction at trial.”
In criminal cases, the evidence must prove the assault happened beyond a reasonable doubt. In civil lawsuits, the claims need only be more likely than not.
“I’m using a civil outlet to make my voice heard,” Hursh said. “I think that he’s dangerous, I think he’s confident in what he does and I think that the public should know that.”
Hursh waited to report the assault to law enforcement for more than a year, and initially reported it to the wrong agency — the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office. Investigators later learned that Bardash’s address fell within the Aurora Police Department’s jurisdiction and directed Hursh there to make a new report, which was filed in March 2024, according to an affidavit from the police department.
No photos of her injuries were taken or provided to law enforcement, but Hursh did provide a medical exam and the names of several people who witnessed her injuries, according to the affidavit. Hursh said investigators told her that the lengthy time between the assault and the criminal case, and the lack of documented physical evidence, made pursuing a conviction difficult.
During the investigation, police discovered that Bardash had been arrested roughly 20 years earlier on assault charges in Broomfield and had previously been accused of sexually assaulting a patient, according to court records.
Colorado’s State Board of Optometry revoked Bardash’s optometry license in March 2004 after he broke into a sleeping woman’s apartment in Broomfield with a knife, according to Department of Regulatory Agencies records.
Bardash failed to appear for his hearing before the optometry board and lost the case by default, according to his license revocation. His actions violated the Optometrists Practice Act, the document stated.
Bardash pleaded guilty to second-degree assault causing injury with a deadly weapon in the Broomfield case on Sept. 3, 2004, according to court records. The plea agreement dismissed several other charges from his case, including burglary, and he was sentenced to five years in prison.
Bardash resumed operations on a new license in 2008. He admitted to his previous felony conviction in the application and completed a three-year probationary period during which he was monitored by a board-approved optometrist.
Bardash fulfilled his probation requirements and regained his full license on Nov. 5, 2011, Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies spokesperson Sarah Werner said. As of Feb. 23, Bardash’s license was still active and no new disciplinary actions had been filed, according to department records.
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The dismissed charges stem from a 2000 incident, where Bardash was accused of rubbing his groin on a patient’s knees at his office and telling her she had “big beautiful breasts,” police wrote in his 2004 Broomfield arrest affidavit.
Bardash’s attorneys wrote in a response to Hursh’s lawsuit that she failed to demonstrate a basis for relief and denied all allegations that Bardash drugged or assaulted her. His previous criminal history and the accusations of misconduct during an eye exam are “redundant, immaterial, impertinent or scandalous” and should be struck from the record, the response stated.
But those incidents are what made Hursh realize this “might not be a one-time situation” and gave her the confidence to report him, she said.
“I think that, with a background that shows violence, with somebody who works directly with the people every day and has patients in enclosed rooms, this is something people need to know,” Hursh said.
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