Article 253 Federal Criminal Code

They are acts or omissions that gravely affect national consumption and shall be sanctioned with imprisonment of from three to ten years and with from two hundred to one thousand days fine, the following:

I.- Those related to articles of necessary or general consumption or to the raw materials necessary to produce them, as well as to the essential raw materials for the activity of the national industry, which consist of:

a).- The monopolization, concealment or unjustified refusal for their sale, with the object of obtaining a rise in prices or affecting the supply to consumers.

b).- Any act or procedure that avoids or hinders, or proposes to avoid or hinder free competition in production or in commerce.

c).- The limitation of production or the handling that is made of it, with the purpose of keeping the merchandise at an unjust price.

d)(Repealed)

e).- The suspension of the production, processing, distribution, offering or sale of merchandise or of the provision of services, that industrialists, merchants, producers, entrepreneurs or service providers effect, with the object of obtaining a rise in prices or affecting the supply to consumers.

If the unlawful conduct is abandoned within the two working days following the moment in which the competent administrative authority requires it, the applicable sanction shall be from six months to three years of imprisonment, or from one hundred to five hundred days fine;

f).- The exportation, without permission of the competent authority when this is necessary in accordance with the applicable legal provisions.

g).- The sale with immoderate profit, by producers, distributors or merchants in general. In the cases in which the undue profit is less than the equivalent of sixty days of the general minimum wage in force in the region and at the moment where the crime is consummated, it shall be sanctioned with imprisonment of from two to six years and from sixty to three hundred days fine;

h).- Diverting, for different uses, merchandise that has been supplied for a determined end, by a public entity or by its distributors, when the price at which the merchandise has been delivered is less than that which it has if it is destined for other uses.

i).- Preventing or trying to prevent the generation, conduction, transformation, distribution or sale of electrical energy of public service.

j)Repealed.

II.- Packaging or packing the merchandise destined for sale, in a quantity less than that indicated as net content and outside the respective tolerance or without indicating on the containers or packing the official maximum price of sale to the public, when there is the obligation to do so.

III.- Delivering with intent and repeatedly, when the measurement is made at the moment of the transaction, merchandise in quantities less than those agreed.

IV.- Altering or reducing by any means the properties that the merchandise or products should have.

V.Reselling to a public entity, at minimum guaranteed prices or at those authorized by the Ministry of Economy (Secretaría de Economía), agricultural and livestock, maritime, river and lake products acquired at a lower price. The same sanction shall be applied to the employee or official of the public entity who buys them knowing of that situation or causes the producer to be obliged to sell at lower prices to third parties.

In any of the cases indicated in the preceding sections, the judge may order, in addition, the suspension for up to one year or the dissolution of the company of which the offender is a member or representative, if the circumstances mentioned in Article 11 of this Code concur.

In the cases of subparagraphs a), f) and h), of section I and of section IV of this Article, the authority that has knowledge of the facts shall proceed immediately to deposit the articles of necessary or general consumption, the raw materials to produce them or the essential raw materials for the national industrial activity. The deposit shall be made in a general deposit warehouse that is a national auxiliary credit organization and the goods shall be generically designated, in the terms of Article 281 of the General Law on Negotiable Instruments and Credit Transactions (Ley General de Títulos y Operaciones de Crédito); when it deals with goods whose special nature does not permit the generic deposit, the specific one shall be constituted, indicating likewise, the term and conditions in which their sale or destruction must proceed in accordance with what Article 282 of the same Law establishes. The deposit certificate that is issued shall have the character of non-negotiable and shall be sent to the Public Prosecutor's Office (Ministerio Público) or, in its case, to the Judge who knows of the process, for the effects that proceed.

What is provided in this Article shall be applied without prejudice to the measures and administrative sanctions that the corresponding laws establish.