Rodriguez-Tirado et al v. Speedy Bail Bonds et al

Filing 184

OPINION AND ORDER re 133 USCA Opinion - remand. Signed by US Magistrate Judge Bruce J. McGiverin on 9/29/2020. (jm)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO
RICARDO RODRÍGUEZ-TIRADO,
ANGELICA TIRADO-VELÁZQUEZ,
Plaintiffs,
Civil No. 13-1671 (BJM)
v.
SPEEDY BAIL BONDS,
Defendant.

OPINION & ORDER
This matter is before me on remand from the First Circuit. Dkt. 133. Ricardo RodríguezTirado (“Rodríguez”) and Angelica Tirado Velázquez (“Tirado”) (collectively “plaintiffs”) sued
Speedy Bail Bonds (“Speedy”) for damages related to the seizure and detention of Rodríguez after
he skipped bail. Docket No. (“Dkt.”) 1. Speedy counterclaimed for breach of contract. Dkt. 12.
After a four-day trial, a jury awarded a verdict in favor of Speedy. Dkt. 106. Plaintiffs appealed.
Dkt. 122. The First Circuit remanded “for further proceedings on the question of whether the jury
instructions as to the tort claims accurately reflected Puerto Rico law.” Dkt. 133 at 7. Parties filed
memoranda, disputing the extent to which Puerto Rico has adopted the bail bondsman’s common
law powers. Dkts. 169, 172. As explained below, Puerto Rico does not recognize the bail
bondsman’s privilege to arrest as it existed at common law, and the jury instructions accurately
reflected Puerto Rico law.
BACKGROUND
As the court and parties are familiar with this case, I recite the facts here only in brief.
In 2010, Ricardo Rodríguez-Tirado ("Rodríguez") was charged with a criminal offense in
New Jersey. He was released on bail, relying on Speedy and American Reliable Insurance as

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sureties. Rodríguez left New Jersey for Puerto Rico and missed a court date. Accordingly, the bail
bond was forfeited. Speedy hired agents (“the bounty hunters”) to find Rodríguez with the hope
of recovering the forfeited bail.
The bounty hunters traveled to Puerto Rico and found Rodríguez near his home in
Aguadilla. They seized him, handcuffed him, shackled him, and took him to a hotel near the airport
while they awaited a flight to New Jersey.
Meanwhile, Rodríguez’s mother, who had witnessed the seizure, sought the advice of an
attorney and made a complaint with the police. A warrant was issued for arrest of the bounty
hunters, who surrendered at the police station. The bounty hunters were criminally charged, but
the charges were ultimately dismissed.
Rodríguez filed suit in federal court seeking damages related to his seizure and detention,
and his mother sought damages for mental anguish. Speedy counterclaimed for breach of the bail
agreement.
At trial, parties disputed that law governing out-of-state bounty hunters, and the court
ultimately adopted the following jury instructions:
IX. BAIL BOND
Now, in this case you heard about a bail bond. A bail bond is a civil contract between the
government and a surety company to have a person charged with a crime released from
incarceration while a trial is pending. The purpose of bail is to secure release of the accused
while a charge is pending, and to assure his presence at the mandated court proceedings.
The entity which signs such an agreement, a surety company, promises to pay an amount
fixed by a court should the accused fail to appear in court for the designated criminal
proceedings.
During the time the accused is released from incarceration after being granted bail, he is
generally regarded as being in the custody of the court and the surety company, and the
surety company’s dominion over the accused is a continuance of the original incarceration.

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X. FALSE IMPRISONMENT
Definition
False imprisonment is the unlawful restraint against his will of an individual’s personal
liberty or freedom of movement. The main idea of a false imprisonment claim is that the
Plaintiff was unlawfully detained, and you should note that because the law protects a
person’s freedom of movement, a person need not be physically incarcerated or arrested
for him to be falsely imprisoned.
Elements
Under the law, false imprisonment occurs when a person, whether that person is a law
enforcement officer or not, by himself or through another person unlawfully detains or
causes the unlawful detention of the plaintiff. To prove this claim, the evidence must show
that four elements were established. First, that Plaintiff Ricardo Rodriguez-Tirado’s liberty
of movement was intentionally restricted. Second, that Plaintiff Ricardo Rodriguez-Tirado
was conscious of the detention. Third, that Plaintiff Ricardo Rodriguez-Tirado had not
given consent to be detained. And fourth, that the detention caused damages to Plaintiff
Ricardo Rodriguez-Tirado.
XI. EXTRADITION: ARREST WITHOUT A WARRANT
Now, you heard evidence regarding efforts to return Plaintiff Ricardo Rodriguez-Tirado to
New Jersey.
Extradition law says that the arrest of a person may be lawfully made by any peace officer
or a private person, without a warrant, upon reasonable information that the accused stands
charged in the courts of a state with a crime punishable by death or imprisonment for a
term exceeding one year, but when so arrested the accused must be taken before a
magistrate judge of a Puerto Rico court with all practicable speed and a complaint must be
made against him under oath setting forth the grounds for the arrest.
Dkt. 111 at 10–12.
After the jury returned a verdict in favor of Speedy, Rodríguez and his mother appealed.
On appeal, parties disputed the meaning of Taylor v. Taintor, 83 U.S. 366 (1873), which
announced that at common law the authority of the bounty hunter to pursue, seize, and return the
bail jumper was well established. As the First Circuit explained, however, the relevant question is
not the United States Supreme Court’s view of any common law doctrine. Rather, Puerto Rico law

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controls. Dkt. 133 at 5. Because parties had not briefed the question of Puerto Rico law governing
out-of-state bounty hunters, the First Circuit remanded for consideration of that issue.
DISCUSSION
In their memorandum of law, plaintiffs contend that Puerto Rico has never adopted the rule
of Taylor—that is, the bail bondsman’s unbounded power to seize his principal. Dkt. 169 at 2.
Rather, they maintain that the only Puerto Rico law applicable to out-of-state bounty hunters is
Puerto Rico’s Uniform Criminal Extradition Act, 34 L.P.R.A. § 1881 et seq. Speedy disagrees,
contending that no law constrains a bailsman’s ability to “perform[] his job in Puerto Rico.” Dkt.
172 at 1.
As the question here implicates both the ancient common law of England as well as that
law unique to Puerto Rico, I begin with some history. At common law, a bail bondsman—also
called a “surety” or “bail”—had extensive power over his principal. See generally Jonathan
Drimmer, When Man Hunts Man: The Rights and Duties of Bounty Hunters in the American
Criminal Justice System, 33 Hous. L. Rev. 731, 744–47 (1996). Acting with the authority of the
sheriff, “‘the bail ha[d] the custody of the principal, and [could] take him at any time, and in any
place.’” Id. (quoting Commonwealth v. Brickett, 25 Mass. (1 Pick.) 138, 139–40 (1829)).
In due course, this concept was recognized in the United States. As early as 1798, the
Supreme Court of Pennsylvania held that a surety in one state could seize his principal in another
state. See Respublica v. Gaoler, 2 Yeates 263, 264 (Pa. 1798). Various jurisdictions affirmed this
view. See, e.g., Brickett, 25 Mass. at 144–46; Nicolls v. Ingersoll, 7 Johns. 145, 153–56 (N.Y.
1810). By 1872, the United States Supreme Court acknowledged the surety’s extraordinary
common law power:
When bail is given, the principal is regarded as delivered to the custody of his sureties.
Their dominion is a continuance of the original imprisonment. Whenever they choose to

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do so, they may seize him and deliver him up in their discharge; and if that cannot be done
at once, they may imprison him until it can be done. They may exercise their rights in
person or by agent. They may pursue him into another State; may arrest him on the Sabbath;
and, if necessary, may break and enter his house for that purpose. The seizure is not made
by virtue of new process. None is needed. It is likened to the rearrest by the sheriff of an
escaping prisoner. In 6 Modern 11 it is said: “The bail have their principal on a string, and
may pull the string whenever they please, and render him in their discharge.”
Taylor, 83 U.S. at 371–72 (internal citation omitted).
Although Taylor announced a rule that had been widely recognized throughout the several
states, see Turner v. Wilson, 49 Ind. 581, 586 (Ind. 1875), that rule would not forever bind the
states. The First Circuit explained why:
[T]he Supreme Court decided Taylor during the regime of Swift v. Tyson, 41 U.S. 1, 16
Pet. 1, 10 L.Ed. 865 (1842), in which courts conceived of the common law as a “brooding
omnipresence in the sky,” S. Pac. Co. v. Jensen, 244 U.S. 205, 222, 37 S.Ct. 524, 61 L.Ed.
1086 (1917) (Holmes, J., dissenting), to which federal and state courts alike accorded
respect unless altered by statute or otherwise in a particular jurisdiction; and the Supreme
Court was itself the final arbiter of disputes about the content of the common law.
This attitude persisted into the twentieth century until it was definitively and dramatically
discarded by Erie R.R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64, 58 S.Ct. 817, 82 L.Ed. 1188 (1938).
Rodriguez-Tirado v. Speedy Bail Bonds, 891 F.3d 38, 41 (1st Cir. 2018). After Erie, states would
define the nature and extent of a surety’s right to seize his principal, regardless of the U.S. Supreme
Court’s view. See id.
The great majority of jurisdictions within the United States had, of their own accord,
adopted the rights and privileges of the English common law. See, e.g., Weishaupt v.
Commonwealth, 315 S.E.2d 847, 852 (Va. 1984) (explaining that Virginia adopted the English
common law except that which was “repugnant to the principles of the Bill of Rights and the
Constitution” or where it is “altered by the General Assembly”) (citation and internal quotation
marks omitted); State v. Lingerfelt, 14 S.E. 75, 77 (N.C. 1891) (“[U]ntil the legislature sees fit to
regulate the manner in which the bail from another state is to exercise his rights, we do not feel at

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liberty (especially in a case of life and death) to assume the exceptional position that the common–
law method as generally recognized in the United States does not apply in North Carolina.”);
Johnson v. Tompkins, 13 F. Cas. 840, 846 (E.D. Pa. 1833) (explaining that the surety’s power over
his principal is “the common law of Pennsylvania as well as of England”). Still, states remained
free to affirm, amend, or otherwise abrogate the common law. See, e.g., United States v. Keiver,
56 F. 422, 426 (C.C.W.D. Wis. 1893) (stating that statute had taken the place of the common law
governing bail).
In 1926, the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws approved a
draft of the Uniform Criminal Extradition Act (“UCEA”). Barton v. Norrod, 106 F.3d 1289, 1296
n.6 (6th Cir. 1997). Aimed at establishing uniform extradition procedures among states, the UCEA
“establishes procedures for the interstate transfer of persons against whom criminal charges are
outstanding.” Cuyler v. Adams, 449 U.S. 433, 435 n.1 (1981). After several revisions, the UCEA
was finalized in 1936 and subsequently adopted by the great majority of jurisdictions, including
Puerto Rico. Id.; Burton v. Mumford, 101 A.3d 577, 584–85 (Md. Ct. Spec. App. 2014). A state
that has adopted the UCEA is bound by its procedures. Michigan v. Doran, 439 U.S. 282, 288–89
(1978).
The UCEA establishes the procedures that apply when a person wanted on criminal charges
flees to another jurisdiction. It charges the governor of an asylum state with delivering up such
persons to the executive authority of the demanding state. See P.R. Laws Ann. tit. 34, § 1881a.
Where extradition is warranted, the UCEA enumerates three manners by which a fugitive may be
arrested, none of which includes unilateral action by an out-of-state bounty hunter. See P.R. Laws
Ann. tit. 34, §§ 1881f, 1881l, 1881m.

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Since the rise of the UCEA, various courts have been asked to determine whether it and
complementary laws abrogate the bail bondsman’s common law arrest powers. Time and time
again, courts have answered this question in the affirmative.
For instance, in State v. Epps, agents of a California surety company pursued their principal
into Oregon. 585 P.2d 425, 427 (1978). They captured him in Portland, returned him to the court
in California, and were thereafter convicted of kidnapping in Oregon. Id. Under Oregon law, a
kidnapping could not occur were it authorized by law. Id. at 427–28. The court examined Oregon’s
enactment of the UCEA and found that it could authorize defendants’ conduct, had they complied
with its strictures: “defendants were legally authorized to arrest [their principal] and take him
before a judge or magistrate with all practicable speed for legal proceedings to determine if [he]
was in fact the person wanted and if the charge against him was extraditable.” Id. at 428. Because
defendants went straight to California without following this procedure, their conduct was not
legally authorized. Id. Although defendants attempted to rely on the rule of Taylor to justify their
conduct, the court explained that, if the common law bail bondsman’s powers had ever been
recognized in Oregon, they had been abrogated by legislation. Id. at 429. In so doing, the court
explained that the common law bondsman’s arrest power was extraordinary, contravening
contemporary notions of civility and due process:
These powers would be far-reaching and abusable enough in the hands of proper and
responsible police authorities. The same powers in the hands of bondsmen is shocking and
frightening. The bondsman is subject to less controls and is possessed of greater powers
than is the law enforcement officer who would exercise counterpart functions. Hence he
can act as a de facto state agent without being subject to the usual safeguards ordinarily
surrounding the conduct of those officials.
When a defendant who is free on bail flees from the jurisdiction of the court under whose
control he is, no matter how metaphysically, the bondsman may pursue, arrest, and return
the truant. The bondsman's powers conflict with the traditional safeguards that protect all
criminally accused during the process of extradition. He can arrest and return a defendant
in a summary manner beyond the powers of peace officers who must follow the procedures

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of extradition. And yet he is acting as part of the administration of the official criminal law
apparatus of the state when he is doing this.
Id. (quoting R. Goldfarb, Ransom: A Critique of the American Bail System 117-18 (1965)). In
enacting the UCEA and related measures, the Oregon legislature, “intended to eliminate the bail
system and its attendant evils in favor of a more civilized system of apprehension and return of
accused and convicted criminals.” Id.
Later, a similar case arose in New Mexico. In State v. Lopez, five men representing a Texas
surety pursued a principal into New Mexico. 734 P.2d 778, 781 (N.M. Ct. App. 1986). Armed,
they approached the home of the principal’s parents, surrounded the home, and demanded the
principal. Id. When denied entry, they kicked down the door. Id. After an exchange of threats, the
police intervened, arresting the surety and his agents. Id. Lopez, the surety, was later convicted of
aggravated assault on a peace officer, attempted aggravated burglary, and aggravated assault, all
with a firearm. Id. at 780. Lopez challenged his conviction, relying on the bail bondsman’s
privilege as announced in Taylor. Id. at 780. The court found Lopez’s argument unconvincing,
explaining that New Mexico had modified the bondsman’s authority to transport principals outof-state with its adoption of the UCEA. Id. at 782. Such transport could only occur where
bondsmen complied with the UCEA’s procedures:
The authority of a private bondsman or his agents to arrest a bonded principal without a
warrant, is qualified by the statutory requirement that the individual arrested must be
promptly taken before a judge or magistrate in this state, to be held pursuant to the Uniform
Criminal Extradition Act.
Id. at 783. In other words, the rule of Taylor would not immunize defendants from criminal
liability.
In the instant case, Speedy intimates that cases such as these are outliers. But this view is
incorrect. Rather, “numerous courts over the past 40 years have found Taylor abrogated by various

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statutory enactments.” Collins v. Clarke, No. 3:13-CV-00763-JAG, 2014 WL 2777438, at *3 (E.D.
Va. June 19, 2014), aff'd, 642 F. App'x 212 (4th Cir. 2016). See, e.g., Ouzts v. Maryland Nat'l Ins.
Co., 505 F.2d 547, 552-553 (9th Cir. 1974), cert. denied, 421 U.S. 949, 95 (1975) (California Penal
Code abrogated foreign bondsman's common law right to pursue, apprehend, and remove his
principal from California); Com. v. Wilkinson, 613 N.E.2d 914, 917 (1993) (“[T]he common law
right of a bondsman to seize a principal for surrender was abrogated by the UCEA.”); Collins v.
Commonwealth, 702 S.E.2d 267, 271 (Va. App. 2010) (“[T]he [Virginia] legislature directly and
irreconcilably abrogated the alleged common law rule that bail bondsmen can seize a bailee at any
time and in any place.”) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted); State v. Flores, 962 P.2d
1008, 1016–17 (Haw. Ct. App. 1998) (explaining that American Samoa’s UCEA required a
bondsman to comply with certain arrest procedures); see also Lund v. Seneca County Sheriff's
Dep’t, 230 F.3d 196, 198 (6th Cir. 2000) (noting that a bail bondsman does not have “the broad
power” to violate the law, but rather “must abide by the law of the state he enters to pursue his
fugitive”); but see Landry v. A-Able Bonding Inc., 870 F. Supp. 715, 721–22 (E.D. Tex. 1994).
With this background in mind, I turn to Puerto Rico law. “Puerto Rico is unique in many
ways, its legal system just one of them.” Rivera-Colon v. AT&T Mobility Puerto Rico, Inc., 913
F.3d 200, 209 (1st Cir. 2019). When the Supreme Court decided Taylor, Puerto Rico was a Spanish
colony. See Puerto Rico v. Sanchez Valle, 136 S. Ct. 1863, 1868 (2016). At that time, “the residents
of the island enjoyed Spanish citizenship and voting representation in the Spanish Parliament
pursuant to the Spanish Constitution of 1876 and Autonomic Charter of 1897.” Consejo de Salud
Playa de Ponce v. Rullan, 586 F. Supp. 2d 22, 28 n.11 (D.P.R. 2008). Puerto Rico’s legal system
was based on civil law, which traces its origins to Roman law, not on common law, which traces

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its origins to medieval England. See generally Ace Am. Ins. Co. v. Wattles Co., 930 F.3d 1240,
1256–57 (11th Cir. 2019) (discussing differences between civil and common law systems).
In 1898, the Spanish-American War ended, and Puerto Rico became a territory of the
United States. Sanchez Valle, 136 S. Ct. at 1868. But Puerto Rico’s civil law tradition continued.
Indeed, in 1923, Justice Holmes, writing for the U.S. Supreme Court, cautioned that federal courts
should not apply “common law conceptions” in Puerto Rico, as the island “inherit[ed]” and was
“brought up in a different system from that which prevails here.” Diaz v. Gonzalez, 261 U.S. 102,
105–106 (1923). And in 1979, a unanimous Puerto Rico Supreme Court held that the
Commonwealth's laws were to be “governed . . . by the civil law system,” with roots in the Spanish
legal tradition, not by the “common law principles” inherent in “American doctrines and theories”
of the law. Valle v. American Int'l Ins. Co., 8 P.R. Offic. Trans. 735, 736–738, 108 D.P.R. 692
(1979).
Today, Puerto Rico remains a civil law jurisdiction. “Even after a century of influence from
the United States' common law system, Puerto Rico's legal system remains one where the
legislature is the only one with power to create the law.” Martinez De Jesus v. Puerto Rico Elec.
Power Auth., 268 F. Supp. 2d 112, 114 (D.P.R. 2003).
This is not to say that the common law is irrelevant to Puerto Rico. To the contrary, “it
shall lie to employ the common law in its multiple and rich versions—the Anglo-American, the
original English, the Anglo-Canadian, and others—as a point of reference for comparative law.”
Valle, 8 P.R. Offic. Trans. at 736–738. Thus, “[w]hen the Civil Code and the Supreme Court of
Puerto Rico are silent on an issue,” courts may turn to common law for its persuasive value. RiveraColon, 913 F.3d at 210.

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In the instant case, although the laws governing bail bondsmen and their principals
correspond, to some degree, with the common law, Puerto Rico has not adopted the common law
outright. Rather, Puerto Rico’s UCEA requires that a surety seeking extradition of a fugitive
comply with certain procedures.
In Puerto Rico, “[e]very person arrested for any offense shall be entitled to be released on
bail or on a condition or combination of conditions. . . .” P.R. Laws Ann. tit. 34a, § 218(a).
The conditions imposed and the bail furnished at any time before conviction shall insure
the presence of the defendant before the magistrate or the corresponding court and his
submission to all orders, summons and proceedings thereof . . . and which in its absence
the sureties shall pay a specified amount of money to the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.
P.R. Laws Ann. tit. 34a, § 219(a). “The bail contract, as established herein, is an agreement
between the Bondsman and the State whereby the former assures the presence of the accused
before the court.” People v. Félix Avilés, 128 D.P.R. 468, 480 (1991). In describing “the nature
and purpose of the bail contract, as well as the surety's liability to the State,” Puerto Rico
lawmakers have stated as follows:
The function of bail is to guarantee to the Government the appearance of the defendant at
the judicial proceedings.
Once the bail is admitted the surety is obliged to ensure the presence of the defendant at
the judicial proceedings brought against him until a judgment is entered. The defendant's
failure to appear at one of the phases of the proceedings without justifiable cause is a breach
of the commitment made to the court and therefore bail must be forfeited in favor of the
Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.
The Government has the responsibility of keeping those persons accused of violating the
law in custody. However, it has consented to being substituted by the surety upon his
request. Therefore, noncompliance by the person on bail is a noncompliance by the
custodian who must answer with the bail posted.
Id. (emphasis added). In other words, when an accused is released on bail, the custody of the
accused passes from the hands of the state to those of the surety. The surety retains a duty to assure
the accused’s presence throughout proceedings. People v. Vazquez, 9 P.R. Offic. Trans. 346, 348–

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49 (1979). If the accused does not appear, the bail may be forfeited. See 34 L.P.R.A. App. II, Rule
227. Once the surety surrenders the principal, “the custody is transferred from the surety to the
State.” Vazquez, 9 P.R. Offic. Trans. at 349.
The notion that the surety holds the principal “in custody” undoubtedly existed at common
law. See Albright v. Oliver, 510 U.S. 266, 278 (1994) (Ginsburg, J. concurring) (“The common
law thus seems to have regarded the difference between pretrial incarceration and other ways to
secure a defendant's court attendance as a distinction between methods of retaining control over a
defendant's person.”); 3 William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England 290 (1768)
(referring to the bail arrangement as a means of placing the defendant in the “friendly custody” of
the surety). That Puerto Rico law and common law have something in common, however, does
not mean that Puerto Rico has adopted the rule of Taylor. Rather, as explained below, in the case
of out-of-state bounty hunters, the procedures established by Puerto Rico’s enactment of the
UCEA govern.
On May 24, 1960, the Puerto Rico legislature adopted the UCEA, 34 L.P.R.A. § 1881 et
seq. (“the Act”). Sánchez v. Superintendente Cárcel, 4 P.R. Offic. Trans. 1208, 104 D.P.R. 862,
864 (1976). The Act establishes procedures governing the arrest of fugitives from another
jurisdiction who are found within Puerto Rico. See P.R. Laws Ann. tit. 34, §§ 1881f, 1881l, 1881m.
Such arrests may proceed by one of three methods. First, the governor of Puerto Rico may solicit
a judge for an arrest warrant, which will be executed by a peace officer or another fit person. Id. §
1881f. Second, any credible person may go to a magistrate and testify that an individual on the
island is a fugitive from justice. Upon proper testimony, the magistrate may issue an arrest warrant,
and a peace officer will find the alleged fugitive and bring him before the magistrate to answer the
charge. Id. § 1881l. Third, any peace officer or a private person may make a warrantless arrest if

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he has “reasonable information that the accused stands charged in the courts of a state with a crime
punishable by death or imprisonment for a term exceeding one (1) year.” Id. § 1881m. Such arrest
is only proper, however, where the accused is taken “before a magistrate of a Court of First
Instance with all practicable speed,” complaint is made against him “under oath setting forth the
ground for the arrest,” and the principal is permitted to answer the charge. Id.
Speedy maintains that it is not bound by these laws. Rather, because Rodríguez entered a
bail agreement, Speedy contends that no Puerto Rico law constrains its authority to enter Puerto
Rico, seize one of its inhabitants, and take him to New Jersey without resort to any of Puerto Rico’s
legal processes.
I cannot square this view with Puerto Rico’s enactment of the UCEA. With the UCEA, the
Puerto Rico legislature established various procedural safeguards protecting those alleged to be
fugitives. For instance, even where the executive authority of another jurisdiction seeks
extradition, the governor of Puerto Rico will not blindly comply with such request. Rather, a sister
sovereign must provide sufficient proof that extradition is proper, including an authenticated copy
of “the indictment, information, affidavit, judgment of conviction or sentence.” Id. § 1881b.
Likewise, a warrant to arrest the accused must “substantially recite the facts necessary to the
validity of its issuance.” Id. § 1881f. Where arrest is made upon credible testimony to a magistrate,
the arrestee must be brought to a magistrate “to answer the charge or affidavit”:
No person arrested upon such warrant shall be delivered over to the agent whom the
executive authority demanding him shall have appointed to receive him unless he shall first
be taken forthwith before a judge of the Court of First Instance of Puerto Rico, who shall
inform him of the demand made for his surrender and of the crime with which he is charged,
and that he has the right to demand and to procure legal counsel.
Id. § 1881i. Similarly, a warrantless arrest may only be made on reasonable information that the
individual stands charged with a felony, and

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when so arrested the accused must be taken before a magistrate of a Court of First Instance
with all practicable speed and complaint must be made against him under oath setting forth
the ground for the arrest as in §1881l of this title; and thereafter his answer shall be heard
as if he had been arrested on a warrant.
Id. § 1881m. Moreover, once an alleged fugitive is seized, Puerto Rico law “guarantees the arrestee
the right to attack the legality of the arrest through a petition for habeas corpus.” Sánchez, 104
D.P.R. at 865.
These safeguards help ensure an orderly and just extradition and offer the accused limited,
yet meaningful, procedural rights. Neither the governor of Puerto Rico nor its courts may inquire
into the guilt or innocence of the arrestee. P.R. Laws Ann. tit. 34, § 1881i. However, they may
inquire into the arrestee’s identity. Id. Such inquiry is significant, helping to avoid situations of
mistaken identity, where wholly innocent individuals find themselves taken away from the island
of Puerto Rico and brought to a foreign court before they can show that the bondsman seized the
wrong person. Were Speedy’s interpretation to stand, the rights the UCEA affords alleged fugitives
would be rendered meaningless whenever an out-of-state bounty hunter was involved. Clearly,
this would undermine the legislature’s purpose. Indeed, the legislature made obvious that it takes
seriously the rights afforded an accused during extradition: an officer who delivers an alleged
fugitive to an agent of the demanding state “in willful disobedience” of the requirement that the
accused first be brought before a Puerto Rico judge is guilty of a misdemeanor. Id. § 1881j.
Of course, under the UCEA an alleged fugitive may waive his rights. Sánchez, 104 D.P.R.
at 864. A surety might argue that, by entering a bail agreement, the principal waived any rights the
Puerto Rico legislature otherwise created. This view too, however, would undermine the UCEA.
Indeed, waiver itself occurs by a certain process: the accused must make said waiver in writing “in
the presence of one of the judges of the Court of First Instance of Puerto Rico” and only after the
magistrate has informed the accused “of his rights to the issuance and service of a warrant of

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extradition and to obtain a writ of habeas corpus.” P.R. Laws Ann. tit. 34, § 1881y. The signing of
a bail agreement does not conform to this procedure.
And even if, arguendo, the accused could waive his rights under the UCEA by entering a
bail agreement, that fact would not permit the bail bondsman to ignore the UCEA’s procedures.
Where another jurisdiction seeks an alleged fugitive who also stands charged with a crime in
Puerto Rico, Puerto Rico law permits the governor, as a matter of discretion, to “either surrender
[the accused] on demand of the Executive Authority of another state or hold him until he has been
tried and discharged or convicted and punished in Puerto Rico.” Id. § 1881r. And Puerto Rico has
not waived this right:
Nothing in this chapter contained shall be deemed to constitute a waiver by the
Commonwealth of Puerto Rico of its right, power or privilege to try such demanded person
for crime committed within Puerto Rico, or of its rights, power, or privilege to regain
custody of such person by extradition proceedings or otherwise for the purpose of trial,
sentence, or punishment for any crime committed herein, nor shall any proceedings had
under this chapter which result in, or fail to result in, extradition be deemed a waiver by
the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico of any of its rights, privileges, or jurisdiction in any
way whatsoever.
Id. § 1881z. In other words, the Act not only creates rights for the accused, but it also acknowledges
that the People of Puerto Rico enjoy the right to see their laws enforced. Under Speedy’s theory,
the People of Puerto Rico would lose that right by virtue of the unilateral action of a bail bondsman.
Finally, Puerto Rico’s purpose in enacting the UCEA advises against recognizing the bail
bondsman’s arrest power as it existed at common law. The Act must “be so interpreted and
construed as to effectuate its general purposes to make uniform the laws of those states which enact
it.” Id. § 1881bb. As explained above, a growing number of courts have found that the UCEA and
other laws abrogate the common law bondsman’s power to arrest. To permit a bail bondsman to
ignore the UCEA’s procedures in Puerto Rico even though he must follow them in other
jurisdictions would undermine the legislature’s aim to make extradition laws uniform. See

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Wilkinson, 613 N.E.2d at 917 (explaining that abrogation of the bondsman’s common law power
to arrest would make for a “more efficient, predictable, and uniform method of interstate
extradition”).
Given that Puerto Rico’s enactment of the UCEA establishes clear procedures for the arrest
of alleged fugitives in Puerto Rico, I see no need to resort to common law to find a special arrest
privilege for bail bondsmen. Doing so would undermine Puerto Rico’s statutory scheme. Further,
I agree with those courts that have noted that the UCEA’s procedures for the arrest of alleged
fugitives are more consistent with contemporary notions of due process than was the bail
bondsman’s extraordinary power to arrest at common law. See Wilkinson, 613 N.E.2d at 917;
Lopez, 734 P.2d at 783; Epps, 585 P.2d at 429. In short, an out-of-state bondsman seeking a
fugitive in Puerto Rico is constrained by Puerto Rico’s enactment of the UCEA. Accord Lund, 230
F.3d at 198 (“The bondsman may be authorized under the law of the state where a bond is made
to retrieve bail jumpers, but he must abide by the law of the state he enters to pursue his fugitive.”).
Turning now to the question on remand, “whether the jury instructions as to the tort claims
accurately reflected Puerto Rico law,” Dkt. 133 at 7, I find that they did. First, the jury instructions
explained false imprisonment as follows:
False imprisonment is the unlawful restraint against his will of an individual’s personal
liberty or freedom of movement. The main idea of a false imprisonment claim is that the
Plaintiff was unlawfully detained, and you should note that because the law protects a
person’s freedom of movement, a person need not be physically incarcerated or arrested
for him to be falsely imprisoned.
Elements
Under the law, false imprisonment occurs when a person, whether that person is a law
enforcement officer or not, by himself or through another person unlawfully detains or
causes the unlawful detention of the plaintiff. To prove this claim, the evidence must show
that four elements were established. First, that Plaintiff Ricardo Rodriguez-Tirado’s liberty
of movement was intentionally restricted. Second, that Plaintiff Ricardo Rodriguez-Tirado
was conscious of the detention. Third, that Plaintiff Ricardo Rodriguez-Tirado had not

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given consent to be detained. And fourth, that the detention caused damages to Plaintiff
Ricardo Rodriguez-Tirado.
Dkt. 111 at 11. This is an accurate recitation of cause of action for false imprisonment in Puerto
Rico. See Berg v. San Juan Marriott Hotel & Stellaris Casino, 261 F. Supp. 3d 213, 218 (D.P.R.
2016) (citing Castro Cotto v. Tiendas Pitusa, 159 D.P.R. 650, 656 (2003)).
Next, the jury instructions explained the nature of the bail bond and the surety/principal
relationship as follows:
During the time the accused is released from incarceration after being granted bail, he is
generally regarded as being in the custody of the court and the surety company, and the
surety company’s dominion over the accused is a continuance of the original incarceration.
This general proposition is in keeping with Puerto Rico’s conception of the bail contract and the
surety’s responsibilities. See Félix Avilés, 128 D.P.R. at 480 (explaining that, under the bail
contract, the state agrees to be substituted by the surety and the surety becomes custodian).
Finally, the jury instructions described lawful arrest for purposes of extradition as follows:
Extradition law says that the arrest of a person may be lawfully made by any peace officer
or a private person, without a warrant, upon reasonable information that the accused stands
charged in the courts of a state with a crime punishable by death or imprisonment for a
term exceeding one year, but when so arrested the accused must be taken before a
magistrate judge of a Puerto Rico court with all practicable speed and a complaint must be
made against him under oath setting forth the grounds for the arrest.
Dkt. 111 at 12. This is an accurate reflection of Puerto Rico’s enactment of the UCEA. 1 See P.R.
Laws Ann. tit. 34, § 1881m.
In sum, although Puerto Rico recognizes that a principal is in the custody of the surety, it
does not recognize the bail bondsman’s unfettered power to arrest as it existed at common law.
Rather, with its enactment of the UCEA, Puerto Rico established procedures applicable to out-of-

1

I note that plaintiffs seem to believe the jury instructions adopted the rule of Taylor. As reflected here, the court did
not instruct the jury that bounty hunters enjoy any special arrest privilege beyond that to which a layman is entitled
under Puerto Rico’s UCEA.

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state bounty hunters seeking to extradite their principals. These were included in the jury
instructions.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
In San Juan, Puerto Rico, this 29th day of September, 2020.
S/Bruce J. McGiverin
BRUCE J. MCGIVERIN
United States Magistrate Judge