A high-ranking National Park Service official improperly helped Washington Redskins owner Daniel M. Snyder broker a deal to cut down more than 130 trees on a hillside between his Potomac estate and the C&O Canal, according to a report by the Interior Department inspector general's office.

The 2004 decision should have been left to park biologists and horticulturists, who had advised against the deal on federally protected land, and should have been opened to public debate, the report says. After an eight-month investigation, the office concluded that P. Daniel Smith, then special assistant to the director of the Park Service, intervened to help clear Snyder's view of the Potomac River.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/18/AR2006051802337.html

Blue plastic tubes surround seedlings planted on a hillside between Daniel M. Snyder's Potomac estate and the C& O Canal after 130 trees were cut down in 2004.

Photo Credit: By Katherine Frey -- The Washington Post Related Article: Parks Official Is Blamed In Snyder Tree Cutting, page A01