Police in Catania, Sicily, have accused a man of training his dog to illegally dump bags of rubbish by the roadside in an attempt to evade CCTV cameras installed to combat fly-tipping. The city's municipal police released footage of the incident on Facebook, showing a small dog trotting along Via Pulacara with a bag of rubbish in its mouth before dropping it neatly at the roadside.
Authorities described the behaviour as 'as cunning as it is doubly wrong', noting that the animal had been trained to spare its owner from being filmed. The police statement said: 'Inventiveness can never become an alibi for incivility.' The city's Facebook post added that the ruse was an attempt to sidestep rules by exploiting an unwitting pet.
Illegal dumping is a persistent problem in Italy, particularly in the south. In 2023, more than 9,300 waste-related offences were recorded, a 66% increase on the previous year. Municipalities are increasingly deploying surveillance cameras, camera traps and smart monitoring systems to curb fly-tipping and misuse of recycling points.
In Palermo, hundreds of cameras and camera traps have been rolled out across all districts, with officials saying 93% of fines for illegal dumping result from camera footage evidence. Under Italian law, unauthorised abandonment of waste can carry fines ranging from €1,500 to €18,000, with the possibility of criminal charges.
