Bucks man charged with "vanity logging"

The crime is more common in Western mountain towns, where people cut down - even poison - their neighbors' trees for a better view.

But "vanity logging," as it's sometimes called, could apply to the alleged acts of a lawyer-turned-Zumba instructor who lives outside New Hope.

Police say David L. Topel felled 22 of his neighbor's old-growth hardwoods - preserved by a conservation easement and worth $260,000 - because they obscured his deck's southern vista.

Topel, 62, faces 22 felony counts of agricultural vandalism, a practically unheard-of criminal charge in Bucks County. He was arraigned in Bucks County Court on Thursday and given an Aug. 21 trial date. Neither he nor his attorney, Jeffrey Solar, returned calls for comment.

Topel owns 15.66 acres atop Solebury Mountain, a gentle rise of farmland, mansions, and woods that constitutes some of Bucks County's most expensive real estate. He purchased the property for $1.7 million in 1994, according to public records.

In September, he allegedly talked to a tree service specialist about removing trees from a neighboring property that blocked his view, according to Kathleen Byrne, an assistant district attorney. But the specialist refused.

By November, more than 20 trees had been cut down, including several posted with "no trespassing" signs. They were part of a protected swath of woods belonging to Sage Meadows at Pidcock, a spacious development of a dozen large homes.

But there wasn't a break in the case until April. Topel allegedly visited one of Sage Meadows' homeowners, and said he "made a huge mistake" and wanted to "make amends."

Homeowners affected by the cutting either declined to comment or could not be reached.

Full atonement could cost at least $500,000.

The value of the trees alone is $260,000, a sum that includes $44,000 for one mature white oak, Solebury Police Detective Roy Ferrari said. Then there's the cost of removing the dead wood, which is crucial to staving off invasive fungi that could add further harm. The price of replanting has not been factored in.

Reports of vanity logging abound in other parts of the country; from Washington state to Wyoming, from North Carolina to Florida, where it's called "hat-racking." And the act is as much about aesthetics as it is property values.

"It happens pretty much anywhere there are hills or water," said Cass Turnbull, president of Plant Amnesty, a Seattle-based group that fights "crimes against nature" that include tree-topping and irresponsible pruning. "I get calls about poisoning, girdling [stripping the bark to kill the upper part of the tree] . . . trees cut down while you're on vacation."

The group hosted a recent symposium on the issue, which on the West Coast has come to involve drawn-out civil suits between neighbors, large fines, and even ordinances that side with people whom Turnbull calls "view-mongers."

"It's a kind of gold fever that makes otherwise rational people feel entitled," she said.

In Bucks County, however, the trees are the gold - not the view, said F. Todd Polinchock, president elect of the Pennsylvania Association of Realtors.

"I've never heard of people who would chop down trees for a better view," said Polinchock, who is based in Doylestown. "People actually love the old trees. We have 100-year-old oaks that are gorgeous. You can't get that anywhere."

So did Topel get a better view?

"It couldn't have been that great, because behind those 22 trees there were more trees," said Byrne, the prosecutor. "As a former attorney, he should have known better on this one."

610-313-8118@Ben_Finley