The Arena Wrong On Crime in Illinois

Look, pretty much everyone hates liter. It’s wasteful, harmful to the environment and, well, just plain trashy. But Illinois has taken anti-littering laws to an absurd new level. And by a absurd new level I mean the careless tossing of cigarette butts on the ground can get you slapped with a felony, a few tens of thousands of dollars in fines and legal expenses, and time in the pokey. Yes, that’s right, prison. While most states are trending toward a more balanced approach to crime and punishment by getting rid of mandatory minimum sentencing and making punishments better fit the crime, Illinois seems to be going in quite the opposite direction. Prison for tossing a couple cigarette butts on the ground? Prison? Seriously? As Chris Berman so famously says, c’mon on man!