You were partly at fault: you do not lose the claim, it is reduced

It is Article 1545 of the Civil Code of 2020: the rule that the injured party’s own imprudence does not eliminate the liability of whoever caused the damage, but reduces the award proportionally.

Whoever suffered damage and contributed to it by their own imprudence, in any of the cases of the fault-or-negligence chapter of the Puerto Rico Civil Code.

• The injured party’s concurrent imprudence does not exempt from liability whoever caused the damage.Verified against the official source
• It entails the reduction of the compensation in proportion to the degree of such imprudence.Verified against the official source
• The rule applies in all the cases foreseen in the chapter on obligations arising from fault or negligence.Verified against the official source

• The record of how the damage occurred: the degree of imprudence that reduces the award is measured from there.

1. 1

   Step 1: First half: it does not take away your claim

   Article 1545: the injured party’s concurrent imprudence does not exempt from liability. Having contributed to your own harm does not release whoever caused it. It is the part most people do not know.

2. 2

   Step 2: Second half: it is reduced proportionally

   The same article: but it entails the reduction of the compensation in proportion to the degree of such imprudence. The consequence is a proportional cut, not the loss of the right.

3. 3

   Step 3: Why this matters before dropping a claim

   The common belief is that having been somewhat at fault closes the case. The article says the opposite, and says it without conditions: it does not exempt. Worth reading before deciding a claim is not worth bringing.

4. 4

   Step 4: It reaches the whole chapter

   The article opens with "in all the cases foreseen in the present chapter". It is not limited to ordinary fault-or-negligence liability: the chapter also includes product liability and liability for others’ acts and without fault.

5. 5

   Step 5: Who measures the degree: the article does not say

   It does not name who must fix the degree of imprudence, by what method, or on what proof. It states the proportion and stops there. This guide does not fill that gap.

6. 6

   Step 6: Nor does it give percentages or examples

   The Code carries no scales, tables or concrete situations here. Any percentage you read attributed to this article does not come from its text, and this guide offers none.

7. 7

   Step 7: Nor whether the reduction has a floor or a ceiling

   The article speaks of a reduction proportional to the degree and fixes no minimum always recoverable and no maximum deductible. What is not written is not asserted here.

8. 8

   Step 8: And a note about the rest of the chapter

   The consolidated text we read is current only through Act 130-2026, and Act 191-2026 later amended two articles of this same chapter. This article is not among them per the reading this site published from that statute, but it is worth knowing when reading the chapter as a whole.

The Code names no agency for this chapter. The proportional reduction is applied by the adjudicator in the Court of First Instance, and the article does not describe how it is measured.

• Dropping a claim believing that having been somewhat at fault kills it: the article says it does not exempt from liability.
• Accepting no payment because you contributed to the damage: the written consequence is a proportional reduction.
• Limiting the rule to ordinary fault-or-negligence cases: it applies in all the chapter’s cases.
• Looking in the article for a percentage or a table: it carries none.
• Assuming a minimum always recoverable: the article fixes no floor or ceiling.
• Not documenting how the damage occurred, which is where the degree of imprudence comes from.
• Assuming the article says who measures that degree: it does not.

These are the government pages this guide is based on.

• Poder Judicial de Puerto Rico

  Poder Judicial

  bvirtualogp.pr.gov