A Koran-burning New Jersey Transit worker, fired for his protest near Ground Zero last Sept. 11, is getting his job back - along with an extra $25,000 for his troubles.
Derek Fenton, 40, will also collect back pay since his Sept. 13, 2010, dismissal for torching pages of the Muslim holy book on the site of a proposed lower Manhattan Islamic center.
The deal additionally pays Fenton $25,000 for pain and suffering and restores his pension credits.
“I feel relieved I have a job,” Fenton told the Daily News yesterday from his Bloomingdale, N.J. home.
Earlier, the 11-year NJ Transit employee released a defiant statement.
“Our government cannot pick and choose whose free speech rights are protected, based on whether or not they approve of the context of our statements or actions,” Fenton said.
“This is the very essence of the First Amendment.”
Fenton, a train conductor, will return to work next week if he completes a physical and a drug test on Monday, said Deborah Jacobs, New Jersey executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union.
Fenton was not working when he arrived at the site of the controversial Islamic center to mark the ninth anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center.
The father of two burned three pages of the Koran to protest the planned center’s proximity to the site of the attack by Muslim terrorists who flew planes into the twin towers.
He was led away by police and never identified himself as a NJ Transit employee. Yet two days later, Fenton was fired.
The ACLU filed suit on Fenton’s behalf, and the deal was brokered before the case went to trial. The state also agreed to reimburse the ACLU for a $25,000 legal tab.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie had backed Fenton’s firing, saying the transit worker’s behavior was “unacceptable.”
The typically talkative governor’s office did not return a call for comment.
Reps for the the state Attorney General’s Office and NJ Transit also did not return calls for comment.