CPI files mandamus against Hacienda over Digimedia invoices

The Centro de Periodismo Investigativo (CPI) went to the Court of First Instance, San Juan Part, with a mandamus for access to information against the Department of the Treasury (Hacienda). The organization asks that interim secretary Nelson J. Pérez Méndez fulfill his ministerial duty of transparency and deliver invoices Hacienda has not released.

The original request went out on September 25, 2024. Reporter José Manuel Encarnación Martínez wrote to Vilmar Trinta Negrón, director of Hacienda’s Communications Office, asking for invoices of the advertising agency Digimedia LLC/MOZart Advertising linked to any Hacienda dependencies between 2021 and that date. After several follow-ups, the invoices did not arrive.

“We have exhausted all available administrative remedies to obtain the information requested through Hacienda’s Communications Office without results. We fulfilled our duty to request the invoices more than two months ago, and with no other remedy existing, we turn to the Court of First Instance, San Juan Part,” said CPI executive director Carla Minet.

CPI, represented by the Access to Information Clinic of the Interamerican University Law School, holds that the request complies with article 6 of the Transparency and Expedited Procedure for Access to Public Information Act (Act No. 141-2019) and that what is requested is public information of high interest to the people of Puerto Rico. The attorneys on the case are Luis José Torres Asencio, Steven P. Lausell Recurt and Judith Berkan.

The petition does not yet resolve the merits: it asks the court to order Hacienda to fulfill its duty to deliver the information. As of CPI’s announcement on December 5, 2024, the Digimedia LLC/MOZart Advertising invoices still had not been delivered by the administrative route.