Officials say they can't stop a South Florida man's plans to shred a copy of the Quran due to free speech, and they're not happy about it.
Boca Raton officials aren't pleased with Mark Rowley's idea of tearing up the Muslim holy text in a public park on Memorial Day, and Deputy City Manager George Brown hopes he'll reconsider.
"On behalf of the Mayor and City Council and the city administration, we find the prospect of the deliberate desecration of a sacred text to be abhorrently offensive. We request that you not proceed with this act," Brown said in a letter sent to Rowley Wednesday, according to the South Florida Sun Sentinel.
Brown said that Rowley's shredding is a free-speech action and doesn't require a permit.
Rowley's initial plan was to burn the Quran in Sanborn Square Park, but he was shot down because Boca doesn't allow fires in its parks.
"My idea is to blow all the wind out of the sails of the terrorists by having this come out in the public eye," Rowley told the Sun Sentinel last week. "I completely disagree that any book that advocates rape is a holy text."
