Pop Intervention

—Courtrai, Belgium

Kimberley Vlaminck blames language barriers and drowsiness for causing her to be erroneously tattooed with 53 more stars than she’d originally asked Tattooist Rouslan Toumaniantz to sketch onto her face. Vlaminck claims that she asked Toumaniantz to etch three simple stars above her left eye, but she awakened to a nightmarish 56 stars, forming a half moon over the left side of her face.

Vlaminck’s first mistake was not running for the hills the moment she walked into The Tattoo Box and took one look at her tattoo designer. Rouslan Toumaniantz has doused himself from head to toe in innumerable, grotesque tattoos, piercings, and nose and earplugs. Not to mention, he must have a dozen lip rings in his mouth. It’s no wonder she didn’t understand what he was saying when he confirmed that she wanted 56 stars on her face—not three, as she contends. If he couldn't hear her, the glasses on his face indicate that he could definitely see what he was doing to her. He claims that she had a mirror and could see him as he was working.



The 18-year-old alleged victim says that she can’t go out on the streets because she’s so embarrassed and she looks horrible. What she really should be embarrassed about is thinking anyone would believe she’d fall asleep with a tattoo needle above her left eye—o r that she believed that tattooing three stars on her face would take so long that she’d fall asleep. She should feel horrible for expecting people to believe that she fell asleep before he moved from above her eye to any other part of her face, or that anyone could fall asleep with a needle poking their face. I personally can’t reconcile that she fell asleep with that man hovering over her at all.

She apparently paid him 55 lira for the work. She's suing for 10,000 lira and the cost of cosmetic surgery. Toumaniantz has offered to pay for half the 8,500 lira cost of removal. Even so, he stands by his claims that Vlaminck was awake during the procedure, observed herself in the mirror several times, and left a satisfied customer. Another customer who had been in the parlor at the same time supports his story. He suspects that criticism from her father and boyfriend, who accused Toumaniantz of drugging Vlaminck, led the girl to concoct the story.

I have never been tattooed, and so I my defer to those who have been to answer my questions.

Pop Intervention Questions of the Day:

• Would you have fallen asleep while this man or anyone else tattoos you?



• Is it even possible to fall asleep during such a procedure?



• Whom do you believe in this situation, the customer who’s always right or the tattooist?

Photos & Facts: the Daily Mail
Video News Story: the Sun