North Idaho man to be sentenced in slaying

SANDPOINT - A former Bonner County resident is scheduled to be sentenced Tuesday for murder and other charges stemming from a deadly confrontation outside a North Dakota strip club.

A jury convicted Jonathan Peter Horvath in July of murder, reckless endangerment and two counts of terrorizing in connection with the shooting death of Derrick Spiegel in Williston, N.D., in March 2013.

Horvath, a 46-year-old California native, had been in North Dakota for less than a week and was seeking employment as a steelworker in the booming oil fields in the northwestern part of the state, according to published news accounts of his trial.

Horvath told jurors he was having drinks with friends when somebody at one of the bars he visited displayed a pistol, which put him on edge. When a confrontation later erupted between Horvath's friends and friends from Spiegel's group, Horvath said he got his gun in an attempt to de-escalate the hostilities.

"I thought grabbing the gun would keep the situation from escalating," The Wahpeton Daily News quoted Horvath saying on the witness stand.

Horvath told the jury the gun discharged accidentally while he and Spiegel struggled with one another and that he did not intend on shooting the 28-year-old man to death.

Horvath said he got a ride back to his hometown of Alexander, N.D., and hitchhiked to Billings, Mont., where he was arrested. Horvath said he was attempting to return to his home in Idaho.

Horvath's trial was moved from Williston to Wahpeton due to extensive pretrial publicity. Wahpeton is more than 400 miles east of Williston.

Horvath moved for acquittal and a new trial, but the motion was denied on Nov. 19, according to a register of actions on North Dakota's online courts database.