Lawmaker proposes removal of helmets by motorcyclists upon entering establishments; initiative aims to facilitate their identification

Deputy Jesús Martín Cuanalo Araujo, of the Ecologist Green Party of Mexico (PVEM), proposed that the Federal Government, state governments, and municipalities include in their traffic regulations that motorcycle drivers and passengers must mandatorily remove their safety helmet once they have dismounted from the vehicle and enter or remain in an establishment, facility, or space open to the public, in order to facilitate their visual identification. While presenting an initiative to reform the General Law on Mobility and Road Safety, he clarified that this obligation will not apply when they remain on public roads engaged in activities related to parking, maneuvering, inspection, maintenance, loading, unloading, assistance, or any other activity that does not involve entering an establishment, facility, or space open to the public. In the statement of reasons, he proposes that regulatory provisions must establish exceptions when the use of a helmet or other protective element is necessary for medical, health, occupational, security, emergency reasons, or any other objectively justified circumstance. The initiative specifies that private individuals will not be authorized to forcibly remove a person's helmet or to carry out body or belongings searches. The legislator explains that motorcycles represent a mobility alternative for millions of people and are used both for private transportation and for work, commercial, delivery, and service activities. However, he warns that the difficulty of identifying someone who keeps their face covered by a helmet inside an establishment is not a theoretical scenario, as there are documented cases in which aggressors have entered businesses with their faces covered by a motorcycle helmet to intimidate or extort merchants, taking advantage of the fact that this hinders their identification by video surveillance cameras and witnesses. Therefore, the initiative aims to facilitate the visual identification of people who, after dismounting from a motorcycle, enter or remain in establishments or spaces open to the public. He considers that visual identification can be relevant for people's safety, the prevention of criminal behavior, emergency response, identification of people involved in illicit acts, the use of video surveillance systems, and the provision of useful information to the competent authorities. The PVEM deputy highlights that data from the Mexico City Ministry of Citizen Security show that 20 percent of crimes committed in the capital are perpetrated by people who use motorcycles as a means to act and escape. For its part, the Citizens' Council for Security and Justice, an organization dedicated to crime monitoring, has also documented reports of assaults, extortion, and robberies of businesses committed by people on motorcycles. You may be interested in: Miguel Ángel Félix, "El Jefe de Jefes," pioneer in cocaine trafficking to the US and leader of the Guadalajara Cartel; Sheinbaum receives Dylan, young entrepreneur excluded from the SEP geniuses event, at the National Palace; Dylan, young entrepreneur, claims he was not allowed into the SEP's genius children event; he seeks to represent Mexico at NASA.