Hatred Of Hydrangeas Leads Man To Maim

An arborcidal maniac terrorizing Union Square Park finally is brought to justice:

An East Village vandal was nabbed red-handed yesterday after rampaging through the roses — and the redwoods and the magnolias — and running up $24,000 worth of damage in Union Square Park, authorities said.

Parks Department officials said David Sasson, 34, of East 14th Street, spent the past three weeks committing horticultural homicide before he was arrested in the park at 1:30 a.m.

Officials said Sasson thrashed 23 hydrangea bushes, 12 red-stemmed dogwoods, 10 holly bushes, seven roses of Sharon, three butterfly bushes, a Chinese dogwood, a magnolia tree and 20 ornamental trees during his three weeks of arboreal abuse.

They had no explanation of why Sasson went on his strange rampage.

Sasson was captured after two officers from the Parks Enforcement Patrol staked out the park and lay in wait for several nights.

“He was in the process of ripping branches off trees,” said Parks Department spokesman Warner Johnston, who added that the arrest went down “very smoothly.”

Sasson used no ax, choosing to take matters into his own hands.

“He was doing this with his bare hands,” said Johnston. “He reached up into the tree branches and pulled off the limbs.”

Sasson faces second-degree criminal mischief charges and something called “destruction or abuse of trees,” said district attorney spokeswoman Barbara Thompson. He could get up to seven years for the bush whacking.

See also: Arborcide — Don’t Do It.