A dangerous escaped felon was rearrested in Mexico and returned to Orange County

SANTA ANA, Calif. – A weeklong manhunt for an extremely dangerous and violent criminal who was the subject of a public warning by the Orange County District Attorney’s Office after he walked away from a Santa Ana halfway house has ended with Ike Nicholas Souzer being arrested in Rosarito, Mexico today. He is once again in custody in Orange County, according to the OCDA.

Ike Nicholas Souzer, 20, was arrested in Rosarito, Mexico by U.S. Customs and Border Protection and Mexican officials acting on information from the Orange County District Attorney’s undercover AB 109 Task Force that Souzer had crossed into Mexico near the San Ysidro/Mexico border.

Souzer was released from custody on Wednesday, March 20, 2024 after he pleaded guilty to one count of felony vandalism and was sentenced to 90 days in county jail (essentially credit for time served) by Orange County Superior Court Judge Larry Yellin and placed on formal probation for two years.

Prosecutors strongly objected to the 90-day credit time served sentence by Orange County Superior Court Judge Larry Yellin, arguing Souzer’s prior criminal history, which includes stabbing his mother to death when he was 13 years old, attacking three correctional officers while incarcerated, and manufacturing and possessing a shank while being housed at the Orange County Jail, should require him to serve out the remaining two years in custody for making and possessing a shank in the jail last year.
In 2021, Orange County Superior Court Judge Gary Pohlson, over the objection of prosecutors, reduced felony charges to misdemeanors and gave Souzer 160 days credit time served for attacking three correctional officers while he was incarcerated.

In October 2023, prosecutors had objected to a three-year split sentence after Souzer was convicted by a jury of making and possessing a shank in the jail last year. Instead of the three years in custody sentence prosecutors had argued for, Orange County Superior Court Judge Michael J. Cassidy sentenced Souzer to one year custody time and two years supervised release. With 50 percent good time/work time credit, he was released from custody just three months later, in January 2024.

Just days after his release in January 2024, Souzer was arrested by the Orange Police Department for spray painting graffiti on a freeway underpass underneath the 55 freeway in Orange and giving officers a false name.

Following his release from custody on Wednesday, March 20, 2024, personnel from Project Kinship, which has spent years advocating for Souzer’s release from custody, transported Souzer from the Orange County Jail to a transitional housing location in Santa Ana. Once he arrived at the house, he left and never returned. Souzer also failed to notify his probation officer of his whereabouts in violation of the terms of his formal probation.

After he failed to report to Orange County Probation, the Orange County District Attorney’s undercover AB 109 Task Force launched an intense manhunt to locate Souzer and bring him back into custody.
In April 2022, Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer also issued a warning to the public about Souzer after he escaped from Project Kinship’s Santa Ana office following his release on electronic monitoring from jail. After a countywide manhunt, the Orange County District Attorney’s AB 109 Task Force tracked Souzer down on Easter at a homeless encampment in Anaheim and arrested him.

“My prosecutors have spent years and years trying to do everything they can to keep this violent criminal behind bars, and at every turn, the very judges who are elected to protect public safety have done little to do so and instead have given him break after break after break,” said Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer. “This is not someone who deserves a break; he has turned every opportunity to turn over a new leaf into a new opportunity to break the law and defy law enforcement. He did not simply walk away and forget to check in with his probation officer. The second he was out of custody he set a plan in motion to flee to a foreign country in yet another attempt to escape the consequences of his actions. I am grateful for the tireless work of the men and women of the Orange County District Attorney’s Office AB 109 Task Force, Organized Crime Unit and DMAT Team, as well as the Orange County Probation Department, the Santa Ana Police Department, the Anaheim Police Department, the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol and the Mexican authorities and for their collaboration and cooperation to once again track down this violent and dangerous threat to public safety.”