A Pong woman facing charges for cutting down protected timber said she didn’t know the trees she feared would fall onto her house were Siamese rosewood.
Chonlada Bamrungya, 44, and four workmen she employed for 30,000 baht were arrested Sept. 6 for chopping down two large, old rosewood trees surrounding her house in Moo 1 village. Officials confiscated 16 logs. Chonlada and the workmen were charged with violation of the Forest Act of 1941 and an order of the National Council for Peace and Order.
Chonlada told authorities that she believed the trees were unprotected Burmese rosewood and that they needed to come down because one was putting pressure on a wall and had branches touching power lines. Another had branches that kept falling on a neighbor’s house. She also had intended to chop down another threatening tree.
Kiatisak Preeda, preservation chief for the regional Forest Resource Management Office, told Chonlada that she should have first petitioned the office for permission to cut down the trees.
The woman insisted she didn’t believe the trees were protected and had, in fact, consulted with the local village chief, an assertion backed up by Moo 1 headman Prajak Moryathia. However, Prajak told the forestry official that while he told Chonlada he too believed they were Burmese rosewood, she should consult Banglamung District’s Environment Department.
Chonlada said she tried to contact the Nongprue Sub-district office, but did not get a response.
Nongprue police chief Pol. Col. Jirawut Tantasri advised Chonlada to collect all the photos and evidence she had showing a good-faith effort to determine the trees’ protected status and seek permission to cut them down, and bring the paperwork to Pattaya Provincial Court when she is tried.
If the court believes it was indeed an accident, Jirawut said, the charges would be dropped.
