Tabarsi accepts plea

A Costa Mesa man who has had several run-ins with the law this year was sentenced to nine years in prison after he pleaded guilty to attacking a man in a coffee shop and failing to register as a sex offender.

Anthony Tabarsi, 41, accepted a plea deal during a preliminary hearing Monday at the Harbor Justice Center in Newport Beach. If the case had gone to trial, Tabarsi would have faced a third-strike conviction.

Costa Mesa Police arrested Tabarsi on April 16 after he pulled a knife on a man at a Starbucks on Harbor Boulevard. After he walked into the store, Tabarsi walked past a group of men speaking Arabic. He quickly turned toward the men and starting making fun of the language.

Tabarsi told one of the men that all Arab people are terrorists and continued to insult them with other racial slurs and expletives. He challenged one of the men to a fight outside of the shop and threatened him with a pocket knife.

After the man’s friends held the victim back, Tabarsi ran and was later found by police at a nearby bus stop. An officer subdued Tabarsi with a Taser gun after he kept walking toward officers refusing to take his hands out of his pockets.

In March, Tabarsi was accused of ducking out one day on two checks at area diners, authorities said. After skipping out on a bill at a Denny’s restaurant on Bristol Street, police chased after him, but gave it up because it wasn’t worth the risk over a modest bill, police said.

About two weeks later, police received a call about a late-night disturbance at the Q Club & Cafe, 1525 Mesa Verde Drive. There officers found an intoxicated man calling himself King Anthony, challenging the crowd to a fight, who matched Tabarsi’s description, authorities said.

Tabarsi was arrested on suspicion of public drunkenness and failure to register as a sexual offender in connection with his 1998 convictions for rape, penetration by a foreign object and molestation of a child under 14.