Food News
Savin Bar and Kitchen had received criticism and made national headlines over hanging up the mugshots of two Boston mobsters.
A Whitey Bulger mugshot inside a Dorchester restaurant has come down following local criticism and national headlines put Savin Bar and Kitchen in the spotlight.
Owner Ken Osherow told The Boston Globe on Wednesday that the mugshot portraits of Whitey Bulger and Stephen “The Rifleman” Flemmi were removed from the restaurant on Oct. 27. The pictures, part of renovations the restaurant had received after being featured on Gordon Ramsay’s “Secret Service” reality TV show, faced complaints primarily from a neighborhood group who thought the decor choices were insensitive for featuring two mobsters that once wreaked terror on Boston.
Bulger and Flemmi also had a connection to the block where Savin Bar and Kitchen is now located. Eddie Connors, who ran the bar in the 1970s when it was Bulldog’s, was gunned down on Morrissey Boulevard likely by Bulger or Flemmi.
“Whitey Bulger traumatized our community and murdered people here and was a drug dealer and hurt people and then fled,” said Donna McColgan at an October Columbia-Savin Hill Civic Association meeting. “I don’t think he should be celebrated anywhere in our community.”
The initial news, first reported by the Dorchester Reporter, blew up into local debates over whether Savin Bar and Kitchen was in the wrong. Even Connors’ son, Tim Connors, shared his thoughts with the Globe, calling the mugshots “disrespectful and distasteful.”
The New York Times and NPR also reported on the spat.
It was soon after those national headlines that Osherow made the decision to take down the mugshots and replace them with black-and-white historical photos of Boston buildings.
“I’m glad they’re down and I’m glad this is behind us, but I felt like it was an ambush,” Osherow told the Globe. Boston.com reached out to Savin Bar and Kitchen for comment but didn’t hear back in time for publication.
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