Pastor Terry Jones: I'm Coming Back to Dearborn

DEARBORN, Mich. (WJBK) - Pastor Terry Jones says he'll be back this Friday, and he's not protesting in front of a mosque. Instead, he'll be on the steps of Dearborn City Hall.

"We are now protesting what they have done to us. They have violated our constitutional rights," Jones said on Saturday at the airport as he was leaving metro Detroit.

The Koran-burning, Florida pastor came to town to demonstrate against radical Islam outside the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn. Instead, he was taken to court and sent to jail because Wayne County prosecutors said he might incite a riot.

"He did not commit a crime. He did not make a speech," said Richard Thompson, president of the Thomas More Law Center.

The Ann Arbor non-profit bills itself as a defender of the religious rights of Christians. They're now representing Jones and appealing the court's ruling. They eventually plan to file a federal lawsuit alleging a violation of the pastor's First Amendment rights.

"We might not agree with what Pastor Jones said, but we will fight to the death his right to say it," Thompson said.

"If Terry Jones becomes unpopular and not allowed to speak about his views publicly, then one day it might be the imam of the mosque. One day it might be myself who someone's trying to censure from speaking freely about their beliefs," said Dawud Walid, who heads the Council on American Islamic Relations.

He's a staunch opponent of Jones and his hateful speech against Muslims and says the prosecutor and court may have had good intentions, but by trying to silence Jones, they've turned up the volume instead.

"Terry Jones has gone from being painted as a racist and bigot to a First Amendment martyr and someone who's standing up for American principles, and this is the problem of the whole issue now," Walid said.

Jones plans to protest outside Dearborn City Hall at 5:00 p.m. on Friday.