Pastor Terry Jones Barred From Biggest U.S. Mosque for 3 Years

In a series of extraordinary court actions, the city of Dearborn barred pastor Terry Jones from going near America's largest mosque for three years.

Jones, who heads the Gainesville-based Dove World Outreach Center, had planned to protest outside the Islamic Center of America on Good Friday. But he instead was hauled before Dearborn 19th District Court after a gun he was carrying accidentally discharged. A jury ruled that Jones' demonstration plans could breach the peace.

The hastily arranged case -- and Jones' brief incarceration for refusing to pay a $1 bond -- was criticized by the American Civil Liberties Union and others who raised First Amendment concerns.

The ACLU said Dearborn police had gone too far by trying to force Jones to post a bond that could hold him financially responsible for police protection.

Police had estimated it would cost more than $46,000 -- including the cost of a helicopter and a dump truck -- to keep violence from breaking out if Jones were allowed to protest, Britain's Sky News reported.

Despite the strange twists to the Jones case Friday and earlier terrorist killings blamed on Jones' burning of a copy of the Quran, U.S. media outlets carried only token coverage of his Michigan activities on a slow news weekend.

Read Jones' statement here.