Osprey - 8-10-2012 at 02:12 PM
The Blame Game
The other day I heard a good one on TV. A female comedienne in an argument with her husband quipped “I didn’t say it was your fault, I said I was
blaming it on you.”
Not much of that flavor honesty around these days. In Mexico (under Napoleonic Law) the blame game is played as hard as anywhere in the world and most
of the time with a great deal of relish.
I got a glimpse of the Mexican Penal Codes and I have a copy of Pesca with the rules about fishing and I can tell you that down here it is all tied to
a guy with a shovel and a wheelbarrow in a barrio close to the center of the grand metropolis of Mexico City.
Actually the guy in Mexico City thing is a very handy tool by which to estimate just how much to blame you are in the eyes of the judicial. If you run
over a goat on the highway, just as you hear the siren, you can begin to do the math for the infraction: labor worker, as of November first, Mexico
City, Mexico = 54.80 pesos per day times the days assessed by the big book.
It’s a two part deal – you are to blame for the loss to the owner of the goat and you are to blame for breaking a law, a rule of the road. The 54.80
applies to the fine for breaking the law but the police or the juez will give weight to both based on your look, your necessary papers, the age of the
vehicle, if you speak some Spanish, if you were impaired when the accident occurred and perhaps if and when you can show the proper amount of remorse.
The police and the owner of the goat aver the goat was worth 800 pesos on the hoof so that’s about all you’ll have to pay for that part. For the
infraction, the police probably have a rule of thumb of 30 days for “Damage to Property of Others”, the goat, and at 54.80 pesos a day that comes to
about 1700 pesos or about $125 U.S. You’ll be glad you reckoned that instead of guessing you would get blamed at the rate of the all-important Mexican
with the wheelbarrow working two weeks to pay off the goat.
You might sense some injustice at play here because if the driver-killer were a millionaire you may expect his blame would be based on a Mexico City
millionaire. That ain’t gonna happen because the labor rate per day is posted daily and millionaires’ earnings are not. If and when you don’t have the
funds to satisfy the judgment, the barrio laborer’s salary will begin to loom larger as the pesos are converted to cell time days in the local
calabozo – while in the cell (rather Spartan, not much food, a little tepid water, no sanitation devices, no temperature control and no bed) you’ll
have lots of time to consider what your cell time might have been years ago when his daily pay was a paltry twenty pesos a day or what the future
might hold when your culpability could be measured by 100 pesos a day.
woody with a view - 8-10-2012 at 05:27 PM
a friend quoted me $60 for a goat to BBQ and that included the grisly part.....
maybe it is the high $ cape region?
keep 'em coming.
Osprey - 8-10-2012 at 05:52 PM
Woody, I don't usually give advice. In this case I would usually back off becuase you're a pal of mine but I would generally say "Never buy a bargain
goat".