LAKE HAVASU CITY – An argument and fight between two out-of-state truck drivers at a business outside Lake Havasu City brings a three-year prison term for Quan Arline, 55. Mohave County Superior Court Judge Lee Jantzen rejected probation in favor of prison during a January 22 sentencing hearing for the Georgia man convicted of attempted second degree murder at trial last month.
Judge Jantzen agreed with deputy county attorney Amanda Claerhout that what began as argument almost one year ago should never have escalated into a fight that saw the commercial truck driver from Texas suffer a cut to his neck from a pocketknife at the truck stop near the junction of Interstate 40 and Highway 95.
Legal Defender Ron Gilleo downplayed the incident, as he did at trial, and said the injury was sustained because of the close proximity physical struggle between the two combatants last Feb. 4.
“He wasn’t trying to slash his throat. He wasn’t trying to stab him,” Gilleo said, noting the victim was not seriously injured.
Arline said he wanted the victim and his family to know his regret and remorse.
“I would like to apologize and let them know I was wrong,” Arline said. “I am truly sorry for my actions … I really wasn’t trying to kill anyone.”
Claerhout said anyone cutting another person with a knife over an argument about how long it was taking to fuel up deserves prison rather than probation. “The defendant slashes the victim in the neck, frankly over nothing,” she said.
Jantzen told Arline he would have derived a different outcome had he not engaged in unnecessary violence.
“The other person had no weapon whatsoever and you brought the weapon to the confrontation,” Jantzen said, in imposing sentence at the Mohave County Law and Justice Center.
Dave Hawkins
Knife fight brings three-year sentence for trucker
