Prestige Capital Corporation v. United Surety & Indemnity Company
Filing
36
OPINION AND ORDER: Granting 10 Motion to Dismiss for Failure to State a Claim. Signed by Judge Gustavo A. Gelpi on 3/28/2017. (Attachments: # 1 Appendix Index, # 2 Appendix Certified Translation) (MET)
CERTIFIED TRANSLATION
Heidi Cazes
USCCI
ATA Certified Translator
Page 1 of 2
TOLIC v. Rodriguez Febles, 2007 TSPR 67 (P.R. Apr. 10, 2007)
C. Finally, we shall consider the last error argued. Petitioner Febles Gordián claims that it was
improper to exempt TOLIC from payment of interest from the date on which the minor’s funds
were consigned until the date when judgment was issued. Her argument is based on the Civil
Code provision establishing that an obligation survives as long as the creditor has not accepted
the consignation or received an order from the court stating that the consignation has been
properly made. Civil Code Art. 1134, 31 L.P.R.A. sec. 3184. Petitioner is mistaken.
[16] Consignation is “the legal deposit… of the thing owed. The asset is placed under the power
of the judicial authority, which shall retain it and put it at the disposal of the creditor.” (Emphasis
removed.) J. Vélez Torres, Derecho de Obligaciones [Obligations Law], 2nd rev. ed., San Juan,
Programa de Educación Contínua, Universidad Interamericana, 1997, p. 186. This concept
“results in extinguishing the obligation; and is a form of payment in the absence of the will of the
creditor.” R. Bercovitz and Rodríguez Cano, and *819 E. Valladares Rascón (scholars), in M.
Albaladejo, Comentarios al Código Civil y compilaciones forales [Commentary on the Civil
Code and Statutory Compilations], Madrid, Ed. Edersa, 1991, Art. 1.181, T. XVI, Vol. 1, p. 297.
This concept is ruled by Civil Code Arts. 1130 to 1135, 31 L.P.R.A. secs. 3185 to 3189. While
Art. 1130 provides that consignation releases the debtor from liability “when several persons
claim a right to collect,” Civil Code Art. 1134 provides that
[o]nce consignation has been properly done, the debtor may request that the court or the
judge order the extinguishment of the obligation.
As long as the creditor has not accepted the consignation, or a court order has not issued
stating it was properly done, debtor may withdraw the thing or amount deposited, leaving
the obligation surviving. 31 L.P.R.A. sec. 3184.
[17] Although this legal provision establishes that the debtor shall not be released from his or her
obligation until there is a corrective court order, this does not imply that debtor is obligated to
pay interest from the time of the consignation until the court order issues. Formal release from
the obligation—which arises from the contract—is one thing, while the requirement to pay
interest is another. “[S]panish doctrine agrees that the retroactive effectiveness of a properly
executed consignation extends to the moment the deposit took place.” (Emphasis in original.)
Vélez Torres, ante, p. 189.
[18] The fact that the court a quo delayed in ruling that the consignation had been properly done
should not give rise to the imposition on debtor of the payment of interest on an amount paid by
debtor in accordance with our legal requirements. If, under those circumstances, we were to
impose the payment of interest from the date of the consignation, we would be undermining the
purpose of Rule 19 of Civil Procedure, 34 L.P.R.A. App. III, which allows for litigation between
opposing parties and is one of the most useful instances of the legal concept of consignation. See
Civil Code Art. 1130, 31 L.P.R.A. sec. 3180.
CERTIFIED TRANSLATION
Heidi Cazes
USCCI
ATA Certified Translator
Page 2 of 2
[19] What the court order does “is to rule *820 that consignation has been properly done and
recognize the intended effect of release sought by debtor when depositing the thing; hence, it
must become effective as of [that] moment.” Velez Torres, ante, p. 189. We thus conclude that,
even though debtor’s formal release depends on the court finding that the consignation was
properly done, payment of interest as of the consignation date does not apply if it was found, in
fact, to have been properly done. We resolve that in cases such as this, where consignation is
ruled to be correct, “the effect of payment is retroactive to the date on which the thing was
deposited …” Bercovitz and Rodríguez Cano, and Valladares Rascón, ante, p. 299.
CERTIFICATION BY TRANSLATOR
I, HEIDI CAZES, an English-Spanish translator and interpreter, duly certified as a Federal Court Interpreter by the
Administrative Office of the United States Courts and by the American Translators Association (ATA), do hereby
certify that I have translated the foregoing document and it is, to the best of my knowledge and abilities, a true and
accurate rendition of its corresponding Spanish original.
Heidi Cazes
USCCI/ATA
February 9, 2017
Date
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