Man pleads not guilty to stabbing, striking an 8-year-old girl at Saggio's

A man charged with stabbing an 8-year-old girl’s neck at a popular Albuquerque pizza restaurant pleaded not guilty this week to child abuse and other felony charges.

Prosecutors allege that Nichalas San Souci, 24, struck the girl in the head with a beer bottle on April 25, then placed something against her neck, causing her to bleed profusely and requiring her to get 19 stitches.

San Souci told the child’s father that he attacked the girl because she “got in my way,” police said in a criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court.

San Souci was indicted in 2nd Judicial District Court on felony charges of child abuse resulting in great bodily harm, aggravated battery and aggravated assault.

A restaurant patron stopped the attack by smashing a tray over the man’s head and helping the girl’s father subdue the attacker, the complaint said. San Souci did not know the girl, prosecutors said.

The random nature of the attack on a young child at a Saggio’s restaurant at Central and Cornell SE alarmed Judge Cindy Leos, who ordered San Souci held in custody while awaiting trial.

Leos wrote in a May 1 order that San Souci “poses a significant danger to the community” and found him “likely to engage in violent, random behavior against innocent individuals, including young children.”

San Souci’s attorney, Graham Dumas, said his client pleaded not guilty to the charges on Monday and that the case remains in the early stages.

Albuquerque police were dispatched to Saggio’s near the University of New Mexico, where they found the girl with “blood smeared on her face, neck, shirt and hands,” the complaint said. A woman was applying pressure to the girl’s neck and blood-soaked towels were scattered on a table nearby, it said.

The girl was transported to UNM Hospital, where she received stitches and was released, a spokeswoman for the 2nd Judicial District Attorney’s Office said.

An officer viewed restaurant security video that showed San Souci “take a bottle and smash it over the head” of the girl, the complaint said.

The attack occurred during a family outing as the girl and her parents were waiting for their food.

The child’s mother told police she took her daughter to look at a fountain at the restaurant when a man approached and sat behind the girl. When the child began screaming in pain, the mother turned around and saw the man holding the girl from behind “and had her by the throat,” the complaint said. The girl “yelled out” but didn’t lose consciousness.

The girl’s father told police he heard his wife yelling “stop! stop!” and saw another patron strike the attacker in the head with a tray, causing him to fall over, the complaint said. The father said he and the second man punched and kicked the attacker, who fled the restaurant.

Police later arrested San Souci outside the restaurant and witnesses identified him as the girl’s attacker, the complaint said. Police patted him down and found a knife.