Litter and illegal dumping laws typically apply to a person or a business. State laws include a variety of litter and illegal dumping acts. Indirect acts also describe situations when litter blows out of a car or boat without being collected and disposed of properly. A catch-all term should prohibit most littering acts. The catch-all legislative drafting technique is an effort to include any behavior that a litterer could argue is not within the scope of the prohibited acts.
State laws define a wide variety of items as litter.
Littering occurs on virtually any type of property or body of water. Other states describe the specific types of real property on which the law may apply. Criminalize the Acts States define littering or illegal dumping as either a civil or criminal offense. Civil and administrative violations have been the traditional means of enforcing pollution laws. However, as society's awareness and concern about the public health and environmental consequences of pollution have increased, criminal laws have become a common method of addressing intentional violations of environmental regulations.