Bad haircuts aren’t a crime. But what this barber did with his scissors was, police say.

The customer had asked for a fairly simple haircut: He wanted the sides of his head shaved with a number two clipper, and an inch of hair cut off the top.

But the term “bad haircut” doesn’t do justice to the mortifying (and bloody) hairdo the 22-year-old man left a Madison, Wisc. salon with on Dec. 22, according to police.

First, the customer’s ear was snipped intentionally by the barber at Ruby’s Salon, the customer said. Then, as it began to bleed, the barber put the zero attachment on his clippers and shaved a severe, bald line right down the middle of his customer’s head, according to a police report.

As the man got up and fled the salon around 2:15 p.m. — with his ear bloodied and his head partially shaved — the barber, Khaled A. Shabani, 46, called out after him, police said.

“You want a zero, right?” Shabani kept shouting, according to a police report.

The customer told police that before the attack Shabani had accused him of fidgeting and moving too much, and then started twisting the customer’s ear, police said.

After the customer left the salon and called the police, Shabani was arrested for mayhem and disorderly conduct while armed.

“While it is not a crime to give someone a bad haircut, you will get arrested for intentionally snipping their ear with a scissors,” Joel Despain, a spokesman for the Madison Police Department, said in a statement.

Shabani told police it was an accident, according to the police report.

The 22-year-old victim shaved his head elsewhere to match the streak Shabani allegedly gave him, police said.

This story was originally published December 27, 2017 at 2:56 PM with the headline "Bad haircuts aren’t a crime. But what this barber did with his scissors was, police say.."