A Clark County judge this week sentenced Nika Nikoubin to 16 to 48 months in prison for stabbing a man during sex in a Henderson hotel room more than four years ago, ending a saga in which she had originally avoided prison time through a plea deal centered on severe mental illness. Nikoubin pleaded guilty to two counts of false imprisonment with a deadly weapon, and prosecutors argued her repeated probation violations left the court no choice but to act.
According to KLAS 8 News Now, prosecutor Kassandra Acosta pushed for more prison time, citing public safety concerns and telling the court that Nikoubin failed to follow the terms of her probation. District Court Judge Jessica Peterson ultimately sided with the state, deciding to keep Nikoubin behind bars despite a defense request for leniency and reinstated probation. Peterson said Nikoubin had received help and treatment through probation but had still accumulated violations, and the judge denied her request for mental health court. Nikoubin will receive credit for 215 days already served at the Clark County Detention Center, per the station's report.
A Stabbing That Began on a Dating App
The case traces back to March 5, 2022, when Nikoubin met Daniel Trevino through the online dating platform Plenty of Fish and the two arranged to meet at the Sunset Station Hotel and Casino in Henderson, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Once there, Nikoubin stabbed Trevino in the neck during sex, and police body camera footage indicated she carried out the attack in retaliation for the U.S. drone strike that killed Iranian military leader Qassem Soleimani, per the same account relayed by KLAS 8 News Now.
Nikoubin reportedly told officers at the scene that the U.S. had killed Soleimani and that a lot of blood had spilled. General Soleimani, who led the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' expeditionary Quds Force, was killed in a targeted U.S. drone strike ordered by then-President Donald Trump in January 2020, as reported by the Associated Press. Separately, arrest records show Nikoubin told investigators she felt motivated to plan and carry out the stabbing after listening to a song called Grave Digger, though she maintained to detectives that she intended only to harm Trevino rather than kill him.
From Attempted Murder Indictment to a Plea Deal
A Clark County grand jury initially indicted Nikoubin on attempted murder, battery with a deadly weapon, and burglary. She eventually pleaded guilty to two counts of false imprisonment with a deadly weapon instead.
In August 2023, Eighth Judicial District Court Judge Carli Kierny granted Nikoubin three years of probation, along with 100 hours of community service and mandatory mental health treatment, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported at the time. Nikoubin was allowed to serve that probation while living with her parents in Texas. During her sentencing hearing, she disclosed that she had immigrated to the U.S. from Iran at age 12 and had suffered a sexual assault at age 18, which she said severely degraded her mental health before the stabbing, according to The Independent. The court had also considered her prior 10-day stay in a mental health facility before she traveled to Las Vegas when it originally granted probation. Nikoubin told the court she had graduated near the top of her high school class, and Trevino himself said he had chosen to forgive her.
Probation Breaks Down Across State Lines
Nikoubin's probation officer later reported that she had met a man through a dating app, sometimes refused to take her prescribed medication, and experienced mental breaks that made her non-compliant with supervision. In April 2026, Judge Jessica Peterson issued a bench warrant for Nikoubin following these violations, while defense attorney Damian Sheets filed a motion to quash, according to Our Nevada Judges.
Those Texas entanglements were not new. In February 2023, the University of Texas at Dallas banned Nikoubin from attending on-campus classes while she lived under house arrest in Frisco, after campus police raised safety concerns upon learning of her pending Nevada indictment, per CBS News. She had enrolled for the spring 2023 semester, and her father worked as an engineering professor at the university. At this week's sentencing, attorney Dowon Kang argued for outpatient care and legal guardianship for Nikoubin rather than incarceration, but Judge Peterson was not persuaded and ordered her to prison, with the hearing held at the Eighth Judicial District Court in Clark County.
Mental Health Claims
Throughout the case, defense attorneys cited severe psychiatric diagnoses, including schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
