García Pérez v. Corporación De Servicios Especializados Para La Mujer Y La Familia

Summary

The Supreme Court of Puerto Rico reaffirmed that in tort the co-causants of damage are solidarily liable and that the timely filing of a complaint against one of them interrupts the prescription period as to the others, provided solidarity is alleged well and sufficiently in the original complaint or in the motion to amend. Applying that rule, it reversed the dismissal as time-barred of the pregnancy-discrimination claims against Dra. Doris González Torres — the Corporation's president and the plaintiff's supervisor, identified in the original complaint as the main author of the discriminatory acts — while affirming the dismissal of the claims against the Commonwealth (E.L.A.). It declined to reach the plaintiff's alter ego/veil-piercing theory as unnecessary at that preliminary stage. Chief Justice Hernández Denton and Justice Rodríguez Rodríguez dissented, urging adoption of the in solidum doctrine under which prescription must be interrupted separately as to each co-causant.