By ADAM PINSKER
WISH-TV | wishtv.com
My Inner Baby was forced to close in August 2022 after the Noblesville city government deemed it was a sex shop and violated the terms of its zoning.
Owner Ryan Polokoff tried to fight that in court, but says he lost on a technicality. “They won due to a procedural error by our attorney. We never had a chance to truly argue our case in court.”
This month, Polokoff reopened his store at another site near the former location, and he’s now heading back to court again.
“We just opened up our shop 2½ weeks ago on June 3, and, on Monday, we got a lawsuit from the city claiming that this is sex shop location 2,” Polokoff said Thursday.
He says he will again try to fight the latest lawsuit, filed June 13 in Hamilton Superior Court 1.
In the first lawsuit, the city claimed My Inner Baby operated as a sex shop by using the #ABDL hashtag, which, he said, “stands for adult baby and diaper lovers.”
“They had issues with that and other hashtags on social media, Google maps and our website, and so we stripped that. We removed it all,” Polokoff said.
The city still believes the store is a sex shop.
The owner of My Inner Baby says people won’t find anything erotic in his shop. What they will find are high-quality diapers that people suffering from trauma use in age-regression therapy. He says some of My Inner Baby’s customers include a trucker, and a woman who’s mom is in hospice.
“We sell Squishmallows, little stuffed animals, and what not. We have adult-sized pacifiers, and a lot of clothing, body suits similar to a One Zee,” Polokoff said.
City Attorney Jonathan Hughes shared a statement by email with News 8, referring to the store by the acronym MIB:
“The Noblesville BZA (Board of Zoning Appeal) affirmed in August 2022 that MIB is a Sex Shop, as defined in the Noblesville UDO (Unified Development Ordinance). MIB appealed that decision in both state and federal court, and the City was successful in both lawsuits. By opening this second location in the same zoning district where the first was located, MIB is deliberately disregarding the Director’s determination, the BZA’s affirmation of that determination, and both lawsuits that followed.”
This story was originally published by WISH-TV at wishtv.com/news/business/adult-baby-store-faces-another-battle-with-noblesville.