Seller of PH-made fake Native Alaskan art gets 2 years in prison

Cristobal Rodrogo sold fake Native Alaskan stone art in his store, Alaska Stone Are.

A businessman in the state of Washington was sentenced to two years in federal prison for selling $1 million worth of objects made in the Philippines and passing them off as Alaska Native works.

According to the US Attorney’s Office in Alaska, Cristobal “Cris” Magno Rodrigo operated two companies based in Alaska between April 2016 and December 2021, going as far as hirig Alaska Native clerks in his stores to falsely represent his wares.

Selling forgeries violates the Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990, a truth-in-advertising law that prohibits misrepresentation in the sale of Native American crafts throughout the US.

Rodrigo’s first store, Alaska Stone Arts, sold mostly stone carvings, and the second, Rail Creek, dealt in wooden totem poles. Both the carvings and totem poles were sourced from Rodrigo Creative Crafts, a company owned and operated by Rodrigo’s wife in the Philippines and created to produce knock-off Alaska Native objects.

Rodrigo has been in the Alaskan tourist trade for over 20 years. He taught people at the company in the Philippines how to copy the authentic styles and motifs of real Alaska Native objects. In 2019 and part of 2021, Rodrigo’s web of family-based companies sold over $1 million in falsified products.

Rodrigo’s two-year prison sentence is the longest anyone has received for this type of crime, according to the Indian Arts and Crafts Board. (The second-longest is only 6 months.)

Rodrigo is also required to donate $60,000 to the Tlingit and Haida Central Counsel Vocational Program, write an apology letter for publication in the Ketchikan Daily News and serve three years of supervised release. Cases involving Rodrigo’s co-conspirators, Glenda Tiglao Rodrigo and Christian Ryan Tiglao Rodrigo, are ongoing.

You may like: Texan sentenced for selling, mailing fake Native American goods made in PH

“The actions the defendant took to purposefully deceive customers and forge artwork is a cultural affront to Alaska Native artisans who pride themselves on producing these historical works of art, and negatively affects those who make a living practicing the craft,” said S. Lane Tucker, US Attorney for the District of Alaska, in a statement.