Germany Examines Legality of Dumpster Diving

The fact that Strangemann supports dumpster diving isn’t in itself a huge breakthrough. He is merely expanding the circle of people who can pick up his waste from garbage collectors to consumers.

But other business owners aren’t. If you inquire at Lidl, Aldi, Rewe or Kamps, one of Germany’s biggest bakery chains, what their policy is about dumpster diving, you will first be given a list of all the things the company does to avoid throwing away food.

Who Owns Discarded Food?

They say they support local foodbanks or they turn buns into animal feed. Recently, Aldi started selling fresh milk in packaging that suggests a laxer relationship with expiry dates. It says: “Smell me! Try me! I’m often fresh for longer!” But some are trying to prevent dumpster diving as best they can. Lidl, Rewe and Aldi Süd place their dumpsters in areas where they are not publicly accessible. Aldi Nord refuses to comment on its dumpsters.

In June, the Justice Ministers’ Conference — the gathering of all state justice ministers in Germany — tackled the phenomenon, with a majority deciding against legalization because it would have “raised complicated legal questions.” One example was whether property damage and trespassing should also be exempt from punishment. They argued that “hygiene and ethical reasons” also argued against it.

Recently, though, prosecutors elected to discontinue one case of garbage theft, partly thanks to the efforts of lawyers like Max Malkus. The 29-year-old believes dumpster diving is legal — for personal reasons, because he himself dumpster dives, but also for professional ones, since he represents other divers as well. His office is located in the building where famed German Marxist Karl Liebknecht was born in Leipzig. It’s not a coincidence, but rather, as he puts it, a “statement.”

He is currently representing two students who would like only their first names to be used: Caro and Franzi. Last year, they were caught by the police dumpster diving on the property of an Edeka supermarket in Olching, near Munich. The police informed the manager of the market, who initially filed charges against the two but later retracted them because of what Edeka described as “countless public attacks and insults.”

In January, a district court found Caro and Franzi guilty of theft. Malkus has appealed and intends to keep fighting until there is an acquittal. “There is nothing more obvious than the fact that an object that someone throws into the garbage bin is considered owner-less.”

The court’s sentence for the two women isn’t without irony. They weren’t just handed a fine of 225 euros each — though the fine was suspended — but they also have to volunteer for eight hours each. At a food bank.

Icon: Der Spiegel

Article source: https://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/germany-examines-legality-of-dumpster-diving-a-1284079.html#ref=rss