Dad Who Owes Child Support Tracked to N.J.; Extradition Set

An Orange County man who owes $31,000 in child support payments is being extradited from New Jersey today to face trial in Santa Ana, ending a 20-month search that spanned two countries.

Orange County prosecutors said the arrest of 48-year-old Steven Horowitz marks a rare instance that authorities have caught up with a deadbeat parent who had fled the state to avoid making child support payments.

Horowitz will be arraigned either today or Monday, charged with 11 counts of failing to pay his $1,354 monthly child support. He faces up to five years in jail if convicted.

Assistant Dist. Atty. Jan Sturla said the case highlights the greater emphasis county prosecutors now place on tracking down the roughly 600 people currently facing arrest warrants for failing to provide family support.

“We intend to increase our resources significantly . . . as well as increase the number of investigators we use to find these guys to bring them to justice,” Sturla said.

The district attorney’s office has come under criticism in the last few years for its mixed record in collecting child support payments. Collections have more than doubled since 1993--to $107 million in 1998. Still, the office fails to collect any child support in 85% of cases.

Dist. Atty. Anthony J. Rackauckas, who took office in January, has made improved child support collections a priority.

Horowitz, who lived in La Paz, Mexico, for most of the time he was on the run, was apprehended after he returned to this country to receive treatment for a blood disease. Tipped off to his whereabouts by Horowitz’s ex-wife, prosecutors requested assistance from the Bergen County Sheriff’s Department. Deputies arrested Horowitz at his mother’s home earlier this month.

Since fleeing Orange County in June 1997, Horowitz had kept in regular contact with his 16-year-old daughter and his ex-wife through e-mail, officials said. He had consistently mocked efforts to capture him, Sturla said.

“Basically, his communications with his wife led us to believe he was saying, ‘Catch me if you can’--and so we did,” Sturla said.

Local authorities in other states often cannot track down offenders from elsewhere because they lack the resources. Failure to pay child support is classified as a misdemeanor, so Sturla said it’s often difficult to convince out-of-state authorities to cooperate.