Thе United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico dismissed the plaintiffs’ diversity tort suit on two grounds: (1) that the Puerto Rico statute of limitations barred the suit and (2) that dismissal wаs warranted because of one of the plaintiffs’ repeated failures to comply with the court’s pretrial orders. We affirm the dismissal on the limitаtions ground and, therefore, find it unnecessary to reach the second ground.
I
On April 4, 1991, the plaintiffs, Mr. Bonilla and his wife, filed a diversity action in the United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico against the defendants. The complaint alleged that on February 5, 1990, while Mr. Bonilla was a guest at the Sands Hotel in Puerto Rico and as a result of the hotel’s negligence, he suffered various injuries when he was struck in the head with a volleyball while in the Jacuzzi area. The complaint sought damages of $1,450,000.00.
More than 16 months later, following repeated failures of Mr. Bonilla to comply with various pretrial (including discovery) orders of the court, the court granted the defendants’ motion for summary judgment and dismissed the complaint. The court held: (1) that Puerto Rico’s one-year tort stаtute of limitations barred the suit, since (a) the suit was filed 14 months after the alleged injury and (b) Mr. Bonilla had not established any of the statutory grounds for tolling the statute; and (2) that dismissal “is also based on plaintiffs failure to comply with court orders.”
II
As noted, Puerto Rico has a one-year statute of limitations for all tort аctions. P.R.Laws Ann. tit. 31, § 5298(2) (1991). Since the complaint was filed 14 months after Mr. Bonilla allegedly was injured, on its face it appears untimely under the statute.
Puerto Rico, however, has a tolling statute which provides:
Prescriptiоn of actions is interrupted by their institution before the courts, by extrajudicial claim of the creditor, and by any act of acknowledgment of the debt by thе debtor.
Id. § 5303 (1991).
The plaintiffs here contend, as they did in the district court, that three letters tolled the statute. These letters were referenced and apparently attached to motions the plaintiffs *393 filed, but the letters were, nevertheless, not part of the record before the district court. The сourt rejected the tolling contention on the following ground:
Defendants have shown that the action was filed more than one year after the incident occurred. Plaintiff, as the non-moving party, must now produce evidence to create an issue of fact as to whether the statute of limitаtions was tolled or not. Plaintiff alludes to letters stating extrajudicial claims which he states were sent to the defendant. However, none of these lеtters are included in the record. Without these letters, which we need in order to determine whether or not the statute of limitations was tolled under Puertо Rico law, we cannot proceed. We, therefore, grant defendants’ summary judgment motion because plaintiff has failed to fulfill his burden of produсtion.
Since the plaintiffs have the burden to support their claim that the statute was tolled, their failure to introduce into the record the letters uрon which they based that claim was fatal to the claim.
See Mesnick v. General Elec. Co.,
In any event, the letters do not support the tolling contention.
The first and third letters were written by the insurance representative of the Sands Hotel and did not admit liability. They, therefore, were not an “act of acknowledgment of the debt by the debtor.” Indeed, the plaintiffs apparently do not claim to the contrary.
The plaintiffs rely upon the second letter, written by Mr. Bonilla’s lawyer to the insurance representative in response to the latter’s first letter, which had sought certain information from Mr. Bonilla regarding the alleged accident. The only possibly pertinent portion of Mr. Bonilla’s letter stated:
I would appreciate that you send me information about the coverage of the policy Sand’s Hotel have [sic] for cases like this and also if you have any representative in Puerto Rico with whom we can discuss and try to settle this case.
The plaintiffs contend that this statement constituted an “extrajudicial claim of the creditor” under the tolling statute.
As this court has noted, the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico “has stated that an extrajudicial claim, in order to have tolling effect, must be ‘precise and specific.’
Jimenez v. District Court,
[t]he letter makes á clear and direct rеference to [the] Law ... under which the present action is brought. The letter describes' plaintiffs services clearly falling within the shield of the [relevant]' law. The mention of amounts of money owed and plaintiffs, warning that his lawyers were being notified lead us to conclude that a claim under [the particulаr law at issue] was being made through this letter and that the letter in fact makes a claim for the relief ultimately sought.
Id.
(footnote omitted). On the other hand, wе ruled insufficient for tolling, a letter that “specified what plaintiffs were requesting, but did not give specific notice of the basis of the lawsuit,” and a second letter in which the plaintiff merely stated his intention to file a complaint against the defendant.
Riofrio Anda v. Ralston Purina, Co.,
We also have nоted that under Puerto Rican law, “[a] proper extrajudicial claim must seek the same relief ultimately sought in the subsequent lawsuit.”
Fernandez v. Chardon,
Neither the request in Mr. Bonilla’s lawyer’s letter for information about the Sands Hotel’s insurance coverage, nor the question whether the insurance representative had “any representative in Puerto Rico with whom we can discuss and try to settle this case,” constituted a “preсise and specific” extrajudicial claim that sought “the same relief ultimately sought in the subsequent lawsuit.” The mere seeking of information regarding a possible discussion and settlement of the case with the insurance representative did not indicate that the plaintiffs were asserting a substantial damages claim for the injuries Mr. Bonilla allegedly suffered.
The letter fell far short of the specificity required to alert the defendant to the particulars оf a likely damages suit. It was not a “request for monetary compensation as a result of an injury suffered” that this court held was the basis of decisions holding that an extrajudicial demand had triggered the tolling of a Puerto Rican statute of limitations.
Hernandez del Valle v. Santa Aponte,
Affirmed.