An illegal immigrant from Peru was sentenced Monday to more than seven years in prison for stabbing an acquaintance three times in the back last summer at the Ketchum Korral cabins.
Fifth District Court Judge Robert J. Elgee sentenced David Rojas-Peralta, 33, to seven years and three months on a conviction of felony aggravated battery. He will be required to spend two years and three months behind bars before he is eligible for parole.
Elgee said Rojas-Peralta will be deported to Peru after he's released from custody.
Defense attorney David Pena argued that one year in the county jail, with credit given for the more than eight months that Rojas-Peralta has been incarcerated, should be sufficient punishment. Pena, from Rupert, claimed that Rojas-Peralta stabbed the man in self-defense and that the message in the case should be that excessive consumption of alcohol can cause non-violent people to do violent things.
Elgee acknowledged that alcohol was a factor in the stabbing but said "the message here in my view is the seriousness of bringing a knife to a fight."
Rojas-Peralta pleaded guilty in December to stabbing 36-year-old Roger Mansecidor Rubin during an altercation at Ketchum Korral cabin No. 37 on the morning of June 22. According to Ketchum police records, the two men got into a fight because Rubin was sleeping in Rojas-Peralta's bed.
At Monday's hearing, Pena said the altercation over the bed should not be trivialized because there were "a lot of people" living in the cabin and Rojas-Peralta's bed was the only space he had for himself.
"Everything he owns is in that tight space," Pena said.
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Pena also called several Peruvian witnesses to the stand who testified that Rubin was a troublemaker.
"We have good testimony here from good citizens of this community that this guy [Rubin] gets drunk—this guy likes to fight," Pena said. "Things got that night bad and he ended up stabbing someone. He could have just run away. ... But he chose to stay. He ended up rendering aid to the victim."
Speaking through a court interpreter, Rojas-Peralta told Elgee: "I feel remorseful for everything that has happened. I ask you to give me an opportunity because I have family in Peru."
Elgee said he would have imposed a harsher since if not for several mitigating factors: one, that Rojas-Peralta has no prior serious criminal record; two, that he has shown genuine remorse; three, that he tried to aid the victim; and four, that he turned himself in without attempting to flee.
Elgee rejected claims of self-defense, saying Rojas-Peralta could have walked away from the fight without resorting to use of the knife.
"What Mr. Peralta did was serious and requires serious punishment," the judge said.
Terry Smith: tsmith@mtexpress.com
David Rojas-Peralta
