P.R. Laws tit. 32, § 3153
The law provides for both injunctive relief and compensatory damages to a plaintiff who sues for misappropriation or violation of the right of publicity. The court may award damages taking into account the following elements: any of the defendant’s profits that are attributable to the use of the plaintiff’s likeness; the amount of any future publicity value the plaintiff may have been denied as a result of the defendant’s infringing activities; the value of the detrimental effect that the defendant act would have caused to the plaintiff; and any other factor the court determines as adequately quantitative of damages.
At its discretion, the court may award compensatory damages for an amount no greater than three (3) times the amount profited by the defendant and/or for any losses suffered by the plaintiff if it determines that the violation was deliberate or carried out with malicious intent.
Alternatively, the plaintiff may choose to request that the court rules for statutory damages. Statutory damages may be awarded in an amount of no less than $750 and no greater than $20,000 per violation, as deemed to be fair by the court. Whenever a violation is determined to be deliberate or due to gross negligence, the court may freely increase the amount of statutory damages to a sum no greater than $100,000 per violation. Each violation under these statutory damages shall be equal to the act of unlawful use of a person’s likeness regardless of the number of copies made of the work in question at any given moment.
Moreover, if the court rules in favor of the plaintiff, the court shall always award for legal costs, attorney fees, and expenses.
Upon the court’s determination that the defendant was unaware and had no reason for knowing or believing that his/her activities constituted a violation of the plaintiff’s publicity rights, the court, at its discretion, may reduce the amount of damages awarded.
The remedies provided in this section are set forth in addition to the remedies provided by any other applicable state or federal statute.
History
—July 13, 2011, No. 139, § 4.