New York techno producer Abe Duque pleaded ‘not guilty’ in a Queens court this week after he was arrested at JFK airport last month for carrying a Rambo-style hunting knife in his hand luggage. Chatting to Skrufff to promote his upcoming album ‘Don’t Be So Mean’ Abe was remarkably calm about his impending trial, explaining the 12 inch blade must have fallen into his hand luggage as he tidied up his studio. “The reason I’m pleading ‘not guilty’ is because I didn’t have it on my person, it was in my luggage. Although that’s technically having it on your person it wasn’t somewhere where I could easily reach it,” he explained. “Because I wasn’t trying to commit a crime, it could happen to anybody.”

Conceding that weapon in question is ‘quite a big Rambo knife style; a borderline machete’. Abe explained that he keeps the Kabar blade as ‘a reminder of my days in the Marine Corps’ and said cops were sympathetic when they learned of his military background. “They were not nice at all until I told them what this knife was about and my story with the marines and then actually they were fine. That’s the reason I didn’t spend the night in jail and actually made it onto my flight. I was 3 hours early anyway. If not, I would have had to answer to a bunch of other people, maybe the FBI would have been called and I’ve have had to met them,” he said. “Maybe I shouldn’t talk about this,” he laughed. “No, no, it’s not that serious, I don’t care. Firstly, even if I lose I won’t go to jail, it’ll just be a fine or something. I have to go back for my trial on June 17.”

Chatting to Skrufff in a Berlin street café the night after he spun at Tresor, the former marine was both polite and softly spoken, though admitted his ultra-tough training came in handy in Scotland three years ago when he ‘got into a fight’ on stage with a drunken Rangers football player. Describing how the player mumbled in his ear incoherently for 15 minutes, Abe eventually shoved him away exasperated. “Wrong move,” he laughed. “He attacked me and we ended up trading punches while my music continued playing a loop. A bouncer came on stage and stood in between us but didn’t kick him off stage, I guess because he was a famous footballer, he didn’t want to offend him. So he stood in between us and kept him back from coming at me. The funniest thing was that the Scots were just there dancing, not caring at all. I guess it was normal for them.”

“I finished the set and went to the side of the stage a little and he came up to me and went ‘you! Me! We’ve got unfinished business! Let’s go’. I said ‘wait’. They’d just given me this huge bottle of whiskey so I said to him ‘look, I can fight you but I can also give you this bottle of whiskey, what do you want?’ He looked at me still angry, then looked at the whiskey, looked at me again, then at the whiskey and took the whiskey and walked away. Later I saw him again outside on the street with the bottle of whiskey, staggering around and yelling.”