Jailed for drug row stabbing
EIGHT MONTHS ON, VICTIM STILL SUFFERS
A MAN was left with a deep eightinch horizontal scar and nerve damage by being stabbed in the neck after a row over drugs, a court has heard.
Drug dealers Jayvarn Booth and Teelan Rock went to collect drug debts from an address in Kitchener Drive, Mansfield, on June 14 last year.
The pair ran a network selling Class A drugs between Mansfield and Nottingham.
But when they confronted a woman inside, a male relative arrived and challenged their “aggressive” behaviour.
As discussions got heated, Booth spat in the man’s face before pulling out a knife and stabbing him in the neck.
When the knife was pulled from the man, it damaged his jugular vein, arteries and nerve endings and caused blood to spray.
The pair left him on a doorstep bleeding, and fled in a car.
Nottingham Crown Court heard how the victim, who was sent to Queen’s Medical Centre for surgery, would have died had it not been for the intervention of a neighbour and emergency services.
He still suffers nightmares, has a permanent scar and problems with his eyelid.
After the offence, 21-year-old Rock arranged for their Renault Megane vehicle to be crushed.
Twenty-year-old Booth, who was 19 when the incident happened, was serving a suspended sentence at the time for possessing a machete.
He was arrested after being identified by a witness, and went on to plead guilty to grievous bodily harm, conspiracy to supply Class A drugs and possessing an offensive weapon.
But after police arrested Rock, he carried on offending, using a prison phone to sell drugs and persuade a friend to try to bribe a witness with cash and drugs. But the conversations were recorded.
Rock, released on licence just 20 days before the Mansfield incident, initially denied perverting the course of justice, assisting an offender and conspiracy to supply Class A drugs but went on to plead guilty.
Yesterday, the pair were jailed for a combined 17 and a half years.
Booth, of Pippin Close, St Ann’s, was jailed for 11 and a half years, including consecutive sentences of eight years and nine months for GBH, 19 months for the offensive weapon charge and 27 months for the drug offences.
Rock, 21, of Carlton Street, Mansfield, was jailed for six years with consecutive terms of 18 months for assisting an offender, three years for the drugs offence and 18 months for perverting the course of justice.
The pair must also pay an undisclosed victim surcharge.
Sentencing Booth, Judge Steven Coupland said: “I don’t deal with you on the basis that you took the knife with you intending to use it. You plainly didn’t.
“But in that moment you made a choice to pull that knife out and use it, and what you did was extremely serious. You stabbed him in the neck, an area of his body where there is a high risk of serious injury, or worse. And then to make things worse you pulled that knife back out. That caused an immediate and lifethreatening injury.
“It damaged his artery and jugular vein, and also one of the nerves in his neck.
“That damage was obvious from the spraying of blood from you pulling that knife back out.
“You left him on a doorstep bleeding, and your only concern was for you and not him.”