I’ve never met anybody who admitted to littering. Who would confess to such a wimpy crime? But litterbugs are out there. Just look at our landscape!

At least one litterbug I know received just punishment. And to make the story better, the guy was a Yankee.

It’s early Sunday morning. People who aren’t in church are sleeping late. Coming down Main Street is a big black Caddy wearing New York tags.

Parked just off Main is a town police car. The cop rubs his eyes in disbelief at what he sees as the Caddy drives by.

Newspapers come flying out of the windows of the Caddy. As the patrolman falls in behind the car, papers continue spewing out of the Caddy. For nearly four blocks, newspaper pages are spread all over the street.

The driver is from New York City. Smoking a big cigar, he is amazed that a Southern cop has stopped him for simply disposing of a used newspaper. "I’m finished with the paper," the driver says, "you can have it."

The cop politely explains that "littering" is a crime, punishable by a fine of up to $200 or 30 days in jail.

The driver is puzzled. So what if he dumped 200 pages of newsprint on the street. "Don’t you have a bank robber or a murderer to catch?" the driver protests — and then goes on-and-on, using every known cliche to insult traffic cops. But this cop is cool. He has something special in mind that fits this crime just right.

"Sir, I can no longer issue you a courtesy summons because you’ve become combative," the officer says in his best public relations voice. "You now have two options: You can follow me to the jail where you’ll be required to post bond, or you can pick up every last piece of your discarded newspaper."

"Excuse me?" the man says. "You expect me to pick up that entire newspaper? I don’t think so."

The officer replies, "Fine, sir, step out of the car and we’ll settle this at the jail."

"Wait a minute, wait a minute, officer. Can’t we settle this in some civilized way?"

"Yessir, we can, if you’ll just get to work and start picking up paper."

An hour later the brilliant Yankee is back on the road again, no doubt muttering under his breath about Southern laws — and stupid cops.