MEXICO Law and Practice Contributed by: Gilberto Miguel Valle Zulbarán, Alejandro Catalá Guerrero and Erick Gustavo Soto Ceballos, Basham, Ringe y Correa
• registering false or inaccurate information of the accounting, tax or corporate operations or transactions or having false documentation related to such records. 2.4 Public Officials Under the FCC, the following actions by a public official are considered criminal offences. • Investing, selling, acquiring, or carrying out any act with economic benefit, directly or indirectly, using privileged information known due to their job, charge, or commission, when such information is not in the public domain, regardless of the connection that such infor - mation has to their respective duties as a public official (Article 220, subsection II). • Granting a remunerated job, charge, or com - mission or service agreement or any other kind of agreement, while being aware that the duties or services are not going to be executed or the agreement will not be fulfilled (Article 215, subsection X). • Illicitly granting: (a) concessions for providing public services or for exploitation, enjoyment, or use of public domain goods (Article 217, sub - section I, paragraph A); and (b) permits, licences, awards, or authorisa - tions of an economic nature (Article 217, subsection I, paragraph B). • Using public funds for different purposes than those for which they are intended, or making an illicit payment (Article 217, subsection III). • Increasing their wealth without proving the legitimate increase in value or origin of their goods and properties acquired when being a public official (Article 224). 2.5 Intermediaries As detailed in 2.1 Bribery and 2.2 Influence- Peddling , the criminal offence corresponds
to the commission by the public official of the criminal act indirectly through third parties or to the benefit of third parties. 2.6 Lobbyists Lobbying activities are regulated by the inter - nal regulations for Mexican Congress, which is comprised of the Senator and the Chamber of Deputies. However, there is no regulation for lob - bying activities before the Executive and Judicial Branches. Lobbying is defined as any activity carried out before both Chambers to obtain a resolution or positive decision according to their own or a third party’s interests. Any individual must be registered before the Senator or Chamber of Deputies to be able to participate as a lobbyist. In Mexico, the statute of limitations for the inves - tigation of criminal offences is the arithmetic average determined by the sum of the minimum and the maximum imprisonment penalty of an offence, the result of which is then divided by half to determine the period in which a crime can be investigated. Moreover, when the criminal offence is being investigated, in the first half of the arithmetical average period determined, the investigation suspends the statute of limitations, and the term can be extended by a half. For instance, when the bribe is more than MXN54,285, the imprisonment penalty goes from two to 14 years, so the statute of limita - 3. Scope of Application 3.1 Limitation Period
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