Legal News

9th Circuit tattoo decision needles Hermosa Beach

By Richard Binder

Tom Waits once wrote about a feeling that was "harder to get rid of than tattoos."  Thanks to a recent decision by the Ninth Circuit, tattoo parlors in Hermosa Beach may now be equally difficult to shake.

Johnny Anderson, a co-owner of a Yer Cheat'n Heart Tattoo and Body Piercing in Gardena, has won his four-year battle against the city's long-held ban on tattoo parlors.  A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed unanimously that such a ban was unconstitutional and an overreaction to health concerns that could be addressed more effectively through appropriate regulation.

The decision reverses a 2008 ruling by U.S District Court Judge Christina Snyder, who said at the time that Anderson's First Amendment rights were not being violated because a tattoo is an expression of the owner's speech, not the inker's. 

The city has suggested it may file an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court.

Full story here.

Full post as published by Legal Pad | LA on September 10, 2010 (boomark / email).