New procedural law for constitutional challenges

June 3, 2013

by Walter Galeana

The Mexican Constitution was amended on June 6 2011, with the intention of obliging every authority in the country to respect human rights and international treaties. These amendments also included a need to reform the procedural law regulating the Amparo trial, through which constitutional challenges are brought.

The Amparo trial is heard by federal courts, and allows individuals to challenge violations of constitutional or human rights The new Amparo law was issued on April 5 2013, and came into force right away (except for cases initiated before this date, which will still be Heard under the previous law). One of the main changes is an obligation to study the merits of cases above any procedural issues, to provide favoured parties with the greatest possible benefit from the trial.

This is an attempt to correct one of the main historic problems with our legal system, where trials would be extended unnecessarily, as appeal courts would focus their study only on procedural issues, remanding cases to lower courts, in order to correct such issues, and to decide freely on the merits. This issue was present in several areas of law, including intellectual property.

 

Another aspect of the new law is the inclusion of a new limitation on petitions for stays/injunctions which cannot be granted when referring to the use of goods that were originally part of the public domain (relevant to mining, forestry, telecommunications, gas, etc) and issues that refer to financial entities, when the public may be harmed.

The change in the law is generally welcome, as it seeks to establish a trial in which justice is preferred over formalities. We have already initiated Amparo proceedings under this law, and we will provide updates on related news.

Source Managing Intellectual Property Magazine, Jun 2013