After years of litigation, a Bavarian police officer is now allowed to get a tattoo with the words “Aloha”. The Ministry of the Interior in Munich said on Friday that the tattoo had been approved for “specific individual cases” and confirmed a report by “Spiegel”.
However, the condition is that the man covers the tattoo on duty so that it cannot be seen. How the Bavarian police will generally deal with tattoos on officers in the future has not yet been regulated. The regulations are currently being “updated,” the ministry said: “Since this process has not yet been completed, we cannot provide any further information on this.”
In 2013, the police officer had unsuccessfully applied for a permit for the tattoo at the police headquarters in Central Franconia, after which various courts dealt with the issue. In the proceedings before the Federal Administrative Court in Leipzig in 2020, he explained that the planned tattoo on his forearm should remind him of his honeymoon in Hawaii. “I just like that.” He’s not a bad cop just because he’s tattooed.
At the time, the Federal Administrative Court decided that the tattoo was not compatible with the Bavarian civil service law. Most recently, however, the Federal Constitutional Court decided in mid-2022 that the case had to be examined again. “Of course I’m happy,” the policeman told the “Spiegel”. However, it was his goal to wear the tattoo openly.