Update: Crif Dogs has announced on Twitter that it has taken down the board, which is great to see. Thank god for the power of social media and props to Married to the Mob owner, Leah McSweeney, for mentioning the issue in the first place.
In the Tweet, the restaurant wrote:
“We recently received some complaints about the Mark Gator board in our Williamsburg location. The board in question is being removed immediately. We regret any harm it may have caused as Crif Dogs in no way supports the crimes of Mark Gator or sexual assault in any form. The board is a nostalgic item from the owner’s childhood and was never meant to offend.”
Regarding the Mark Gator board in our St. Marks location pic.twitter.com/ZdMX5OjVT5
— Crif Dogs (@CrifDogs) October 19, 2016
It’s not uncommon for homage to be paid to murderers and thieves though one would think that businesses that serve the public would be a little more judicious when it comes to honoring confessed criminals convicted of relatively recent, horrendous crimes. Case in point Crif Dogs, a hotdog restaurant located in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, where Married to the Mob designer, Leah McSweeney, discovered it was celebrating none other than rapist and murderer Mark Anthony “Gator” Rogowski through a display of one of his boards.
Covered in the documentary Stoked: The Rise and Fall of Gator, Rogowski was a widely-admire professional skater, a career that was at its height during the ’80s and went into decline in the ’90s when the sport moved away from vert to street style skating.
On March 21, 1991 at his home in San Diego he raped and murdered Jessica Bergsten, a woman he knew through an ex-girlfriend. Rogowski dumped her body in the desert, where she was found a month later by campers. Ragowski fully confessed to the crime and is currently serving a 31 year prison sentence in the California State Prison System.
When McSweeney mentioned the board to a Crif Dogs employees, they defended the displayed skateboard and joked about putting it behind bars. According to her Instagram post:
“As I waited for a hotdog at Crif Dog i looked on the ceiling and realized they had a Mark Gator board in glass as if it was a hero’s prized possession. Mark Gator is a convicted rapist and murderer. And ex pro skater. Not a hero. Not a skateboarder who should be remembered as anything except a fuckin psycho rapist and killer. What about the victim? How would her family feel walking into this place? I asked the guys that worked there if anyone ever complained about it. And they looked at me like I was crazy and said “how should we display it? Behind bars? Do you know how much that board is worth?” Apparently it’s worth Jessica Bergstens life. I am so grossed out and haven’t been able to get this off my mind since I saw it last night. Thoughts? If you feel as I do please email them on their website www.crifdogs.com”
According to the restaurant’s website, Crif Dogs is owned by childhood friends Jim Meehan and Brian Shebairo, a former skateboarder whose bio makes reference to collecting vintage skateboards.
Though skateboard culture prides itself on being counter-culture and operating outside of mainstream societal dictates, in reality it very much embraces macho culture and has long been viewed as the opposite of female friendly so the display of a Gator board isn’t all that shocking. Seeing women as less-than-outsiders is so par for the course within the culture, the hostile message conveyed by the board probably didn’t even occur to the owners.
We have sent an email to Crif Dogs to see what they have to say about the board.
