Starry Night

A teenager got the shock of her life when she asked for a few small tattoo stars and woke up to find half her face was covered in them. Kimberley Vlaeminck, 18, is now suing the tattoo artist who she claims went way beyond what she had asked for.

The Belgian teen says she woke up in pain after falling asleep as Rouslan Toumaniantz drew the permanent ink designs. She then discovered 56 "frightening" black stars of different sizes from her nose to ear and brow to chin.

"I wanted him to tattoo on just three little points but he suggested three stars, saying it would look prettier,” Vlaeminck said.

"When he started the tattooing I didn't want to feel the pain and so I went to sleep. I woke up when he was starting to tattoo my nose and I saw what he had already done. I counted 56 stars, it's frightening."

But Toumaniantz, who works in the town of Courtrai, denied that his client had fallen asleep and said he fulfilled her request. "She was awake the whole time," he said. "I don't use hypnosis or drugs. She agreed to it. The problems started when her father and his friend saw the tattoos."

Vlaeminck, from the city of Kortrijk, about 50 miles north-west of Brussels, said she wanted to keep the tattoos on her forehead but would have the rest removed. She now hopes they can be taken off using laser surgery, which would cost thousands of dollars.