P.R. Laws tit. 32, § 2699
With regard to the welfare of the adoptee, it is hereby provided that adoption proceedings be made expeditious and flexible, as well as confidential, in order to protect the constitutional right to privacy of the parties. The confidentiality of adoption proceedings, and in some cases, the identity of the adopting parents, is intimately linked to the welfare and convenience of the candidate for adoption. On the matter of adoption, the public policy is as follows:
(1) To grant the people of Puerto Rico full powers, in suitable cases, to give in adoption those children under their custody and guardianship, whose parents have been deprived of patria potestas and custody, when the welfare and best interests of minors and disabled children dictate it.
(2) To facilitate adoption proceedings in the most liberal and the broadest way possible within the legal system in force in Puerto Rico, by providing for simple, straightforward, and expeditious proceedings whose transactions shall not exceed a total of seventy-five (75) [sic] from their beginning to their final resolution, and to furthermore substantially simplify and liberalize the legal requirements for issuing adoption decrees.
(3) The firm application of this statute involves a pressing social interest of the utmost importance, considering the present times in which, for reasons obviously attributable to irresponsible parents and other sectors of our society, there are thousands of mistreated, abandoned, deserted and homeless children.
(4) It is the responsibility of the Department of the Family or the adoption agency to carry out the corresponding expert social study so that the courts may exercise their power as parens patriae in pursuit of the welfare and convenience of candidates for adoption. In every case in which a petition for adoption is filed, the Department of the Family or the adoption agency shall be requested to undertake an expert social evaluation. The court shall make a determination to such effect according to the specific circumstances of the case, taking into consideration the recommendations of the report on the expert study, but such action shall not constitute a limitation on its authority to decide on the adoption.
History —Jan. 19, 1995, No. 9, § 1; Dec. 18, 2009, No. 186, § 33, eff. 30 days after Dec. 18, 2009.