From the Birmingham, AL newspaper, regarding the suburb Leeds:

Leeds police forced a hairstylist who dressed up as Jesus and drenched himself in fake blood to come down off a 14-foot-tall cross he set up in front of his hair salon on Monday.

Patrick Conaty, owner of Running With Scissors hair and nail salon in downtown Leeds, got up on the cross about 2 p.m., his bald head fitted with a long black wig and his waist wrapped in a sheet splattered with red stains. He declared it "Salvation Awareness Day."

Workers from nearby businesses stepped outside to stare.

"I think he needs some clothes on," said Reda Wilson, who works at The Warehouse, a bargain store across the street. "I think he needs to get down."

Leeds police Officer Wendell Carter thought so too. He arrived at 2:30 p.m. and persuaded Conaty to come down off his cross, saying he needed a demonstration permit.

"We called City Hall for a crucifixion permit," Conaty yelled down with his arms outstretched on the eight-foot-wide crossbeam. He said a city official gave approval on the phone last week for his religious display, which included a sign in the hair salon window saying, "This is what Jesus did for you. What are you doing for Jesus?"

Police Chief Tony Hudson and City Manager Donnie Womble soon arrived on the scene. They noted that Conaty had blocked off parking spaces by tying a string from a tree to a potted plant to the back of a Ford pickup truck. "Blocking parking - not supposed to do that," Womble said.

"We ain't bustin' Jesus," Womble said. "We don't want to put Jesus in jail."

But city officials did make Conaty clean the fake blood stains off the new sidewalk, which Leeds had spent $381,000 to upgrade this year. Conaty, wearing a crown of thorns, poured bleach on the stains and used a push broom to clean them off. He said he got the blood from a party store.

as a completely off-topic observation...$381,000 for a sidewalk? Goodness.