Cortés-Rivera v. Dep't of Corrections and Rehabilitation of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico

Enrique Cortés-Rivera, a doctor, appeals from a grant of summary judgment entered by the district court on his claim that his contract to provide medical services was illegally terminated. Cortés-Rivera worked as an independent contractor in Puerto Rico’s Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (DOCR) between 2002 and 2007. He alleges that DOCR and its managing corporation, the Correctional Health Services Corporation (CHSC), discriminated and retaliated against him on the basis of disability in violation of Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act (§ 504), and Puerto Rico state law.

The district court treated Cortés-Rivera’s pleading, styled as a motion to oppose CHSC’s summary judgment motion, as untimely. The main thrust of Cortés-Rivera’s case was that he was an employee of CHSC and DOCR for purposes of his Title I and § 504 claims, not an independent contractor. In granting summary judgment for CHSC and DOCR, the district court made three holdings: (1) Cortés-Rivera was not an employee of CHSC or DOCR for purposes of the ADA, (2) Cortés-Rivera neither objected to a magistrate judge’s conclusion that his non-employee status precluded his reasonable accommodation claims under § 504 nor adequately presented this issue to the district court, and (3) Cortés-Rivera had failed to raise a federal retaliation claim. The district court declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over Cortés-Rivera’s state-law claims. We affirm.