A state lawmaker wants to repeal a law that allowed a Dearborn judge last week to briefly jail a Quran-burning pastor who wanted to demonstrate outside the nation’s largest mosque.

“Not that I agree with the things Pastor Terry Jones has said or done, but people on the left and the right are furious about how his First Amendment right of free speech was attacked through the application of this law,” said state Rep. Tom McMillin, R-Rochester Hills.

McMillin said he applied for a bill and anticipates bipartisan co-sponsors because “people can’t believe this guy got jailed for something he had yet to do.”
Jones — who rallied outside Dearborn City Hall on Friday — was jailed for failing to post a “peace bond.”
An obscure state law allows local courts to weigh written complaints that a person threatens to commit a crime. If the complaint is found to be valid, a judge can order a peace bond.
A jury found that Jones’ planned protest outside the Islamic Center of America was likely to breach the peace and 19th District Judge Mark Somers ordered Jones and an associate, Wayne Sapp, to post a $1 bond.
They refused and were sent to jail. They were released about an hour later after posting the bond.
Somers’ decision, which included an order that Jones and Sapp must stay away from the mosque for three years, has been appealed by the Thomas Moore Law Center, an Ann Arbor-based Christian advocacy group.
The American Civil Liberties Union also has criticized Dearborn and Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy for the incident.
Dearborn’s public gatherings ordinance was rewritten in 2008 following a federal court finding that portions were unconstitutional due to a lawsuit filed by the civil rights group.
Michael Steinberg, legal counsel to the ACLU in Michigan, said the incident with Jones shows the rewrite didn’t go far enough.
“As vile as the speech of Pastor Terry Jones is, it was a small demonstration being proposed on public land and under the rewritten ordinance, he should have been able to express his views,” said Steinberg, who added that no other city in the state generates more complaints about free speech issues.
George Saieg, a Christian Arab American from California, has sued Dearborn for being prevented in 2009 from handing out literature at the annual Arab International Festival on Warren Avenue. That case is pending in federal court.
Four Christian missionaries arrested last June at the festival were found not guilty of breach of the peace after a September trial in Dearborn’s district court.
One of the four, Nageen Mayel, was found guilty of a misdemeanor disobeying a police officer. The Thomas Moore Center is appealing her conviction, and has filed notice of its intention to sue the city when the criminal case is concluded.
The city was ordered in 2008 to pay the ACLU $108,000 in legal fees. Richard Thompson, president of the Thomas Moore Law Center, has said he also will seek legal fees from Dearborn if the missionaries win their criminal case.
“Dearborn isn’t anti-free speech,” Dearborn City Attorney Debra Walling said Friday. “We are very encouraging and liberal of First Amendment rights here.”
Walling said it was simply “unfortunate” that the location of Jones’ request for a demonstration, “on that particular day” — Good Friday — prompted the city to turn him down. In court documents, the city noted that nearby churches planned services and a protest would create traffic problems.

Source: detnews.com