Under-the-Table Land Deals Exposed: Municipality Sells Plots Illegally

Three plots of land in Celestún, previously owned by the municipality, were sold without adhering to legal procedures. The sale was backed by records from a council session that never occurred, as revealed by court documents.

The plots were purchased by J.A.P.V., representing “Desarrollos Edén Maya,” for a sum of 2.9 million pesos. This amount was less than 2% of the land’s actual value.

The legal proceedings against the company’s administrator are ongoing. The Fourth District Court has denied him an injunction, thereby supporting the decision of a lower court judge. The judge had linked him to the process for the crimes of illicit use of powers and embezzlement, all committed in collaboration with others.

This decision was confirmed by the Second Collegiate Criminal and Civil Chamber of the Superior Court of Justice of the State.

The data collected indicates that the operation did not comply with the provisions of Section II, paragraph b, of Article 115 of the Political Constitution of the United Mexican States. Six of the ten minimum requirements established in Articles 154 and 155 of the Municipal Government Law of the State of Yucatán were also not met.

These include the lack of a two-thirds vote of the Celestún City Council members during the 2018-2021 term. Minutes of a meeting that never took place were submitted to the notary public, with the aim of simulating approval.

Furthermore, there is no report from the then mayor or the trustee that proves the need to sell the property and that records the justification for its benefit, as well as the use of the proceeds from the sale, even though the sale was onerous.

Nor is there a location plan containing a description of the area, measurements, and boundaries. As part of this scheme, worthless documents were used at various times, consisting of cadastral certificates and plans that do not correspond to plots 3886, 3887, and 3888 of the town of Celestún, passing them off as valid before the notary public.

The cadastral and commercial values ​​do not correspond to the actual value at that time. Operating prices were set based on untrue cadastral records and with values ​​far below the corresponding values, resulting in a custom “property appraisal” in the amounts of $1,746,276; $842,176; and $371,548, respectively.

The total was $2,960,000, which even contravenes the provisions of the Celestún Municipal Revenue Law for the 2021 fiscal year. At that time, the price per square meter for land adjacent to the Gulf of Mexico was set at $2,500.

The statement signed by the then mayor and the trustee, stating that the property is not and will not be used for the provision of a public service, was also missing.

Neither was the respective certificate issued by the competent institution, such as, in this case, the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), that the property has no archaeological, historical or artistic value requested nor was it available. This institution was never asked for any information regarding cadastral tables 3886, 3887 and 3888.

Finally, the then-Legislature of the State Congress was never informed about the sales authorized by the Celestún City Council from 2018 to 2021, which, according to the Government Law, was required to be done within a period of no more than 30 days from the date of the sale.

The value of the land

In this regard, the judge considered that JAPV’s intervention consisted of providing, knowing the illegality of its act and to the detriment of municipal assets, cadastral certificates that did not correspond to reality in order to obtain a real estate appraisal signed by an expert on January 23, 2021, in order to justify the price and obtain a profit for the company it represents by acquiring real estate at a value far below the actual value at that time.

The expert determined that the cadastral tables 3886, 3887 and 3888 had a value of $842,176, $371,548 and $1,746,276, respectively, which in total represents the amount of $2,960,000 that he paid by check, which in fact added up to the amount of 3 million ten thousand pesos, being this even higher than that established in the notarial instruments relating to the alienation.

However, according to a ruling issued by the Attorney General’s Office, these lands were valued at $35,964,080, $17,235,870, and $193,977,120, respectively, in 2021. In other words, they were purchased at 1.19 percent of their actual value.

In this way, a deficit materialized to the detriment of Celestún’s assets, in addition to the fact that this “real estate appraisal,” as has been pointed out, was based on documentation that did not correspond to the value tables established in the Celestún Income Law in 2021.