Puerto Rico Moves to Join Interstate Deposition Framework

Hola! from Puerto Rico, where that U.S. territory’s Senate recently advanced legislation modernizing how lawyers obtain witness depositions across state lines. According to the Uniform Law Commission, a bill adopting the Uniform Interstate Depositions and Discovery Act was approved by the Senate’s judicial committee on Jan. 19.

If adopted, Senate Bill 765 would amend Puerto Rico’s rules of civil procedure by abandoning the territory’s cumbersome letter rogatory system in favor of UIDDA’s widely adopted and more efficient approach to securing pretrial deposition testimony from persons outside the trial court’s jurisdiction.

The Senate Judicial Committee report accompanying Senate Bill 765 asserts that the current system hampers justice administration, particularly in cases involving states within the United States.

Currently, Puerto Rule 40.6 requires attorneys to use commissions or letters rogatory. These processes are somewhat archaic. Essentially, they are formal requests to foreign courts for permission to subpoena witnesses residing in their jurisdiction. The need to obtain judicial approval creates delays, increases costs, and requires judicial cooperation between jurisdictions. Puerto Rico’s existing framework reflects provisions that were established in 1979.

The Senate Judicial Committee report accompanying Senate Bill 765 asserts that the current system hampers justice administration, particularly in cases involving states within the United States. The method also creates unpredictability for litigants, according to the report.

The Uniform Law Commission finished work on UIDDA in 2007. By August 2025, 46 states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. Virgin Islands had adopted UIDDA in some fashion. In states with UIDDA on the books, litigators can domesticate out-of-state deposition subpoenas merely by filing them with the clerk of a court in the county in which discovery is sought to be conducted. UIDDA fast-tracks the deposition subpoena process by directing local court clerks to domesticate out-of-state subpoenas without delay, and without the need for judicial intervention.

UIDDA is reciprocal legislation, meaning that its benefits are available only among jurisdictions that have adopted it.

The proposed amendments in Puerto Rico would create a ministerial process for obtaining out-of-state depositions. Under the new Rule 40.6, parties in litigation before Puerto Rico’s courts could request the Court of First Instance clerk to issue subpoenas when witnesses reside outside Puerto Rico but within another U.S. jurisdiction that has adopted UIDDA. The committee note identified several reasons why the territory ought to adopt UIDDA:

• The UIDDA process is an expedited administrative procedure requiring no preliminary judicial intervention
• Costs to litigants will decrease substantially by eliminating the need to retain local attorneys and observe letter rogatory formalities
• Puerto Rican witness rights will remain protected through the receiving jurisdiction’s procedural rules
• UIDDA will harmonize Puerto Rico’s system with nearly all U.S. states and territories, facilitating cooperation in interstate litigation

The legislation clarifies that requesting such subpoenas under UIDDA does not constitute an appearance in the receiving jurisdiction’s courts. Once the clerk receives the request, the clerk must promptly issue the subpoena for service on the witness.

Senator Rivera Schatz introduced Senate Bill 765 on Oct. 7, 2025, with several co-authors. The Senate referred the bill to its Judicial Committee, which issued a positive report on Nov. 13, 2025, recommending approval with amendments. The committee note accompanying the legislation indicated that, despite requests, none of the contacted entities — the Puerto Rico Bar Association, the Puerto Rico Lawyers Association, or the Courts Administration Office — submitted comments regarding the bill. The full Senate has yet to vote on Senate Bill 765.

Here in the United States, Massachusetts, Missouri, and New Hampshire are the remaining UIDDA holdouts. According to the Uniform Law Commission, UIDDA-adoption legislation has been proposed in each of those states during the current legislative sessions. There’s no guarantee these efforts will bear fruit; all of these states have considered UIDDA bills in prior years, without approving them.