2023 Laws of Puerto Rico › TITLE FIFTEEN - Sports and Parks (§§ 1 — 2020) › Subtitle 1 - Generally (§§ 1 — 915) › Chapter 18 - Cockfighting Act (2004) › § 301a - Definitions

For the purposes of this chapter, the following words and phrases have the meaning expressed below:
(a) Secretary. — Refers to the Secretary of the Sports and Recreation Department.
(b) Sports and Recreation Department. — Refers to the Sports and Recreation Department of Puerto Rico.
(c) Cockfighting Affairs Commission. — Commission attached to the Sports and Recreation Department, with the powers provided by the Secretary through Regulations.
(d) Cockfighting Affairs Office. — Office that is an integral part of the Sports and Recreation Department in which the Secretary delegates the power to direct the sport of cockfighting.
(e) Professional sports controller. — Person authorized by the Sports and Recreation Department for the physical inspection of cockpits, cockfight betting and other events related to this sport in Puerto Rico.
(f) Pit judge. — Person holding a license in effect from the Sports and Recreation Department to act according to this chapter, who is responsible for judging cockfights pursuant to this chapter, and who represents the Sports and Recreation Department in the judging of cockfights.
(g) Registration judge. — Person holding a license in effect from the Sports and Recreation Department to act as such, as provided by this chapter.
(h) Registration judge assistant. — Person authorized by the operator of the cockpit to transfer the gamecocks that are ready to fight to the cockpit, pit them, and place them inside boxes to begin the fight, and other tasks assigned to them. They work under the supervision of a registration judge.
(i) Cleaning technician. — Person designated by the operator of the cockpit and authorized by the Sports and Recreation Department to assist the registration judge in the washing and cleaning of gamecocks as well as in detecting foreign bodies or substances in the gamecock and its spurs.
(j) Cockpit operator. — Person responsible for the operations of a cockpit, who shall be duly authorized and legally empowered to supervise the activities conducted in the cockpit and have a cockpit certification in effect, issued by the Sports and Recreation Department, for that specific cockpit.
(k) Cockpit owner. — The actual owner, tenant, administrator or operator of a cockpit who, for the purposes of this chapter, acts as the owner of a cockpit.
(l) Examining officer. — Person designated by the Secretary to preside over any administrative hearing.
(m) Officers. — Persons authorized by the Sports and Recreation Department to enforce the provisions of this chapter, inherent to their office.
(n) Register of fights. — Form provided by the Sports and Recreation Department for registering gamecocks, with the details of the fights and administrative information.
(o) Match start. — Time in which the first fight begins regardless of its turn in the register of fights.
(p) Plastic spur. — Spur made of a thermoplastic polymer material.
(q) Disposable spurs. — Those plastic spurs that will be rented at the time of equipping the gamecock in the spur attachment area; after the fight is over, the pit judge shall break them. For the purposes of this chapter, it shall be understood that the owner of the gamecock rents said spurs from the cockpit from the time in which the gamecock is equipped for the match until the pit judge destroys the same.
(r) Cervical dislocation. — Procedure through which the vertebra of the neck area are separated. To disjoin, displace, dislocate.
(s) Holiday. — A holiday established by federal or Commonwealth laws as well as those established as such by the Governor of Puerto Rico.
(t) Cockpit. — The main component of the physical structure where the cockfights authorized by the Cockfighting Affairs Office are held. Any other activity conducted within said physical structure in which the cockpit is located may not interrupt cockfights. These shall be protected by the provisions of §§ 2251 et seq. of Title 3, known as the “Small Business Administrative and Regulatory Flexibility Act”.
(u) Cockfighting Affairs Office Director. — Officer entrusted to control, direct, and regulate the sport of cockfighting, by delegation of the Secretary, and to oversee administrative matters.
History —July 31, 2007, No. 98, § 4, eff. 90 days after July 31, 2007.