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“There is a high duty upon a tattoo artist to double check that everything is precisely as it ought to be before putting a needle to someone’s skin and potentially making permanent something that the person would not want on their skin… A spelling mistake is clearly a breach of that duty of care,” he wrote in his decision.

Experts say such mistakes aren’t uncommon, and point to one man’s “Genious” tattoo (it wasn’t ironic), and an NHL player who celebrated his team’s playoff victory with a ‘‘Stanley Cup Champians” tattoo.

On Dec. 17, 2010, Ms. Huckle walked into Newcombe’s Ink with a printout of “See You at the Crossroads” in a gothic font. She and tattoo artist Helena Pelletier found a similar font on the office computer.

Ms. Huckle confirmed the spelling on the screen and the paper template were correct, but the template was too big. Ms. Pelletier produced a smaller version, and placed it on Ms. Huckle’s ribcage. She asked her to look in the mirror to check.

“It was backwards,” said Ms. Huckle. “And I had already checked the spelling, so I was looking at the placement of it, the size of it, the font, making sure everything was OK.”

Ms. Huckle didn’t notice the missing “r” until she got home. She immediately spoke to Newcombe’s Ink co-owner Adam Spencer.

“He was very co-operative, and said, ‘No problem. We’ll do whatever it takes’,” Ms. Huckle said.

She refused the offer of a cover-up tattoo. He refunded the cost of the tattoo and contacted a tattoo-removal technician. But after eight sessions, during which only “The Cossroads” was removed, he stopped returning her calls, Ms. Huckle said.