Substitute address and confidentiality

They are two distinct protections against the same threat: that the aggressor locates you. One is an evidentiary privilege over what you tell whoever is serving you. The other is a paper address government agencies can hand over instead of yours when someone requests public records. The Substitute Address Register for Victims of Domestic Violence is integrated by the Criminal Justice Information System.

Article 4.3 says the Register’s organisation shall provide this protection “to any person residing in Puerto Rico, regardless of their address of origin and of that person’s immigration status”, and shall extend it reciprocally to any domestic-violence victim who had established residence in Puerto Rico or who for that reason moved to another jurisdiction. For the purposes of that protection, the words “residence”, “residential” and “resides” are understood in their common and ordinary meaning.

• Residing in Puerto Rico, regardless of address of origin or immigration status; or having established residence in Puerto Rico and moved to another jurisdiction because of the violence (Article 4.3).Verified against the official source
• The Act does not print the enrolment procedure. Article 4.3 creates the Register and says what it is for, but publishes no form, office, term or application requirements, and refers to a regulation that is not part of this compilation.

Information pending verification.

1. 1

   Step 1: What you tell the Advocate Office is privileged

   Article 4.2 requires the Women’s Advocate Office to take measures guaranteeing the confidentiality of the communications and information it receives from its clients in the course of providing prevention and intervention services for domestic-violence victims. And it goes further than an internal policy: “Every communication between the persons served at the Women’s Advocate Office and its staff shall be privileged and shall be protected by the confidentiality privilege established in the Rules of Evidence of Puerto Rico”.

2. 2

   Step 2: The privilege is not limited to one office

   The same Article 4.2 continues: “Likewise, every communication between a domestic-violence victim and any other public entity or body providing services to domestic-violence victims shall enjoy the same privileged and confidential character, in harmony with Rule 26-A of the Rules of Evidence of Puerto Rico and the Bill of Rights of Victims and Witnesses of Crime”. That is, the privilege follows the victim across the entities that provide these services, not one particular logo.

3. 3

   Step 3: What the substitute address is for

   Article 4.3 directs the Criminal Justice Information System to integrate the creation of a Substitute Address Register for Victims of Domestic Violence, “for the purpose of establishing strategies and protecting these victims, enabling government agencies and instrumentalities to respond to every public records request without revealing the location or address of a victim of violence, in order to protect them from their aggressor”. It answers the concrete problem that many government documents are public and carry your address on them.

4. 4

   Step 4: How that address works

   The substitute address is used as a residential, work or school address, as applicable to the participant or their children, for receiving mail, with maximum size and weight set by regulation. And the Act says something important about it: “The substitute address assigned to a participant in this Register shall bear no relation whatsoever to the real residential address of the domestic-violence victim”. In addition, all the participant’s other addresses remain subject to the confidentiality of communications this Act establishes.

5. 5

   Step 5: Who it protects, and from where

   Article 4.3 extends the protection to any person residing in Puerto Rico, regardless of address of origin and immigration status, and extends it reciprocally to any domestic-violence victim who had established residence in Puerto Rico or who for that reason moved to another jurisdiction. The Act clarifies that “residence”, “residential” and “resides” are understood in their common and ordinary meaning, that is, without requiring legal domicile.

6. 6

   Step 6: Agencies are required to collaborate

   Article 4.4 authorises departments, offices, bureaus, commissions, boards, administrations, councils, public corporations and other government agencies and instrumentalities to provide the Criminal Justice Information System with the services and support resources needed to carry out the duties this Act assigns it, and to give it the necessary support, subject to the laws governing each agency.

7. 7

   Step 7: What the Act does not say, and we will not invent

   Act 54 creates the Register and describes the protection, but it does not print how to apply: there is no form, filing office, term or list of requirements in the text, and the article itself refers to “the regulation established for those purposes”, which is not part of this compilation and which we did not read. That is why this guide publishes no procedure. If you want to enrol, the reasonable channel is to ask the legal advocate or the Women’s Advocate Office — which is exactly the channel Article 4.2 makes privileged.

The Substitute Address Register is integrated by the Criminal Justice Information System, and Article 4.4 authorises the rest of the Government’s agencies to give it the support it needs. The Act does not publish where or how a person enrols, so the practical entry point is the Women’s Advocate Office or the legal advocate assisting you, whose communication with you Article 4.2 makes privileged.

• Believing the confidentiality is an internal office policy: Article 4.2 makes it a privilege under the Rules of Evidence.
• Thinking the privilege only covers the Women’s Advocate Office: it reaches any public entity or body providing services to victims.
• Assuming the substitute address resembles the real one: the Act says it shall bear no relation to it.
• Believing it only works for the home: it is used as a residential, work or school address, yours or your children’s.
• Assuming immigration status leaves you out: Article 4.3 expressly says it does not.
• Believing moving off the island removes the protection: it extends reciprocally to someone who moved for that reason.
• Assuming your other addresses are unprotected: the Act subjects them to the confidentiality of communications.
• Expecting large mail to arrive anyway: maximum size and weight are set by regulation.
• Looking in the Act for the enrolment form: it is not there, and no honest guide can invent it.
• Confusing this protection with a protection order: they are different remedies sought in different places.

These are the government pages this guide is based on.

• Departamento de Justicia de Puerto Rico

  Justicia

  bvirtualogp.pr.gov