The mission of the Environmental Protection Agencyfs (EPAfs) criminal enforcement program is to investigate, help prosecute and deter the most egregious environmental offenders. Our nation's environmental laws include criminal provisions that address knowing and negligent environmental violations. For example, an intentional decision to discharge pollutants into a river without a permit, or to bypass a required pollution control device, would be a 'knowing' environmental violation, and thus a criminal act. Criminal enforcement brings to bear the possibility of incarceration and monetary fines that are EPA's strongest sanctions. Since the criminal enforcement program was established in 1982, most of the environmental crimes that EPA has investigated involve these 'knowing violations' of the law, which are classified as felonies under the Clean Air Act (CAA) and Clean Water Act (CWA), as well as the federal hazardous waste law-the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA).