Hutton Hotel in Nashville

A legal advocacy group has warned the management of a Nashville hotel that canceled its contract to host a conference on radical Islam that it must honor its commitment or face potential legal action.

 

Mat Staver of Florida-based Liberty Counsel, who also is a planned speaker for the conference, emphasized in a letter to Stephen Eckley, senior vice president of hotels for Amerimar Enterprises, that First Amendment liberties are at stake.

Eckley's company owns the Hutton Hotel in Nashville, where the Preserving Freedom Conference was scheduled for Nov. 11, as WND reported Monday.

Get your autographed copy of Pamela Geller's "Stop the Islamization of America" directly from WND.

Eckley told WND it was his decision to cancel the Nashville event, explaining that management had received "veiled threats that there were going to be protests that could easily erupt into violence."

In his letter, Staver told Eckley, "If you truly have received serious threats of violence in response to legitimate First Amendment expression, you have an obligation to report it to the government, not act in concert with the demands of radical Islam.

"Have you indeed informed the civil rights division of the Department of Justice of these threats?" Staver asked. "Have you turned over all information in your possession to the Federal Bureau of Investigation for you to verify and investigate? If not, why not?"

Staver contended that failure to report the threats constitutes "outright cooperation and apparent agreement with those demanding the silencing of 'critics of Islam'" and could subject his company "to liability for conspiracy to commit civil rights violations, in addition to contractual liability for unjustifiable breach of contract."

Meanwhile, as WND reported yesterday, a former Democratic state lawmaker in Maryland is pressing a hotel in Annapolis to cancel a similar event, charging in an open letter backed by Islamic groups that the speakers include "the nation's leading Islamophobes." In addition, WND reported last week that the Hyatt Place Hotel in Sugar Land, Texas, near Houston, canceled an anti-Shariah event after complaints reportedly by the Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR.

CAIR has sued the co-author of a WND Books expose, "Muslim Mafia," which uses primary source material to document its founding as a front for the Muslim Brotherhood, the parent of terrorist groups such as al-Qaida and Hamas.

Staver told Eckley there is insufficient time to obtain a new venue, and logistical arrangements will have to be changed or canceled, resulting in the loss of tens of thousands of dollars.

He said the Hutton Hotel's director of events, J. Curtis Hinton, signed a contract with Lou Ann Zelnick, on behalf of the Tennessee Freedom Coalition, to provide the location for the conference.

Staver pointed out that in discussions leading up to the arrangement, Zelnick informed Hinton that the conference was for the purpose of discussing Islamic law, radical Islam terrorism, and their effects on American society.

"Ms. Zelnick and other speakers at the conference are nationally known, prominent individuals in their fields," Staver wrote. "A copious amount of information is readily available describing the nature of their position on the above-mentioned issues, from both friend and foe."

Staver said Hinton, at the time, voiced no concern about the conference or the speaker list, and there is no clause in the contract that "gives you the authority to act as you have done."

The Nashville conference, which is co-sponsored by WND, features Robert Spencer, author of 10 books about Islam and director of Jihad Watch, and Pamela Geller, a WND columnist, editor of the blog Atlas Shrugs and author of the book "Stop the Islamization of America: A Practical Guide to the Resistance."

The CAIR legal attack on WND's author is far from over. WND needs your help in supporting the defense of "Muslim Mafia" co-author P. David Gaubatz, as well as his investigator son Chris, against CAIR's lawsuit. The book's revelations have led to formal congressional demands for three different federal investigations of CAIR. In the meantime, however, someone has to defend these two courageous investigators who have, at great personal risk, revealed so much about this dangerous group. Although WND has procured the best First Amendment attorneys in the country for their defense, we can't do it without your help. Please donate to WND's Legal Defense Fund now.

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