Excerpt:
The questions of public safety versus freedom of speech were raised Monday in the opening arguments of a trial for four Christian missionaries accused of inciting a crowd while videotaping themselves proselytizing at the Dearborn Arab International Festival in June.
"You will hear that this case has to do with freedom of speech, but it has absolutely nothing to do with that," Dearborn Assistant Attorney William DeBiasi told jurors. "The trial is about the choices the defendants made."
Nabeel Qureshi of Virginia, Negeen Mayel of California and Paul Rezkalla and David Wood, both of New York, were charged in July with breach of peace after police said they received a complaint from a Christian volunteer working at the festival who said he was surrounded and harassed by the group. Mayel also was charged with failure to obey a police officer's order.