Costa Rican attorneys are the resource for legal advice and for the application of laws of Costa Rica. Lawyers, like the U.S, practice specialties such as criminal law, immigration law, domestic or family law, trademark law, offshore banking, investment and financial law to name but a few. In Costa Rica, lawyer is termed “abogado”, the Portuguese word for lawyer. The most common reasons to hire an attorney are the following:
- Incorporate a new company or trade agreements.
- Apply for residency
- Purchase real estate (this is a must)
- Start a business
If somehow you get involved in a criminal activity, Costa Rica is a complexity of Napoleonic law. In other words, Guilty until Proven Innocent! You may sit in jail for a year (and/or just rot depending on the nature of the crime) before someone will look at the case and/or a bond can be posted. Drugs, sex with a child, etc these type of cases are treated very harshly.
If you think you have a civil suit, such as, suing a poor coffee shop owner when you got burnt on a cup of coffee, chances are it will get laugh out of court, while your attorney is laughing all the way to the bank. If you think you have suffered some mental condition, forget it! Like most Latin Countries, unless one sees blood, there is no case. Read more... (665 words, 2 images, estimated 2:40 mins reading time)
Cerveceria Costa Rica new beer, Rock Ice Golden Monkey has been described as too fruity and heavy tasting.
Costa Rica’s national brewery, the Cerveceria Costa Rica, which is owned by the Florida Ice and Farm Company produces over 39 million gallons of beer a year. That amount does not include the imported beers like Corona and a few US beers. So, wanting to add more zest back in June they announced a new beer, the Golden Monkey Rock Ice. This is Costa Rica’s first designer special beer for the gourmet beer drinker who likes those micro-brewery exotic flavors. This beer flaunts the flavor of the mangosteen fruit from Indonesia.
Cerveceria Costa Rica is spending a lot of money promoting this beer, complete with hot looking Ticas, cruising in strange custom built cars.
Personally, we have never heard of this fruit and probably of the reasons why (according to our research) is that it can not be legally imported into the United States … in other words, not available commercially … something about a fear of fruit flies. Read more... (817 words, 4 images, estimated 3:16 mins reading time)
INS tells their Insurance brokers there would be “consequences” if they sold any other company’s products.
Every Costa Rican knows [since they can remember] the government monopoly of, oil/gas, electric, internet, and insurance has been one big headache after another. In Oct, 2007 when Costa Rica’s Free Trade Agreements (FTA) were signed, it looked like for the first time Costa Rican’s were going to get a break, when foreign companies could compete with government companies, especially for insurance. Ticos, for the first time would be able to pick a company based on service, care, quality, and cost.
Over a year later it looked like FTA was not working, then Canada’s American Life Insurance Company (ALICO) and a few others had received approval to sell in Costa Rica.
But has it happened? Well not quite as expected.
One of the first signs it was under undergoing, “Rules of Engagement” was with the new requirements for foreign residents (expats or permanent residents), who had to show proof of medical insurance to the government Caja, Costarricense de Seguro Social, which forced Expats scrambling for coverage from Instituto Nacional de Seguros, (INS), and/or Caja Costarricense de Seguro Social, (CCSS), which is government’s socialized medicine. Very few got coverage from foreign companies. Read more... (633 words, 1 image, estimated 2:32 mins reading time)
Silver-hair Oswaldo Villalobos with one of his lawyers. Photo from A.M. Costa Rica/José Pablo Ramírez Vindas
We posted back in Aug, 2009 (Government Get Sued) and Dec, 2009 (Investors Suing Costa Rica Government) thats when the Canadian investors formed a group to sue the government of Costa Rica in an attempted to recoup money lost in the Villalobos Ponzi scheme they would probably lose … they did in arbitration this past week.
About 200 creditors had organized (out of the 6000 who had invested) and sought $200 million dollars in damages from Costa Rica’s government, claiming they did not exercise sufficient oversight to prevent Luis Enrique and Oswaldo Villalobos from taking over $1 billion in a 20 plus year unregulated load scheme. The scheme also involved drugs in Jaco and a business center in San Pedro. The IRS also got involved investigating Americans who had invested.
The Villalobos investment scam paid up to 3.5 percent a month on deposits of $10,000 or more that started in the late 1980s; some put in millions. After a landslide of complaints, finally, in late 1990s the judicial department started to investigate which lead to the conviction and sentencing of one of the brothers, Oswaldo who got 18 years. The other, Luis Enrique Villalobos Camacho, fled the country and still is a fugitive, convicted of fraud and illegal banking. His whereabouts is unknown. Read more... (475 words, 1 image, estimated 1:54 mins reading time)
Hiring a person to pick a few bushels of coffee off your land may cost you more than you think, that is if you are not paying the payroll taxes
The scenario starts innocently enough. Expats come to the country and start looking for someone to help with household chores like maid or gardener service. If you are not living in a gated community where they have these services, it starts by asking around for references or putting the word out in their community.
Try not to place an ad in some local paper or post one in a market down the street, because all kinds of weirdos answer them. Some even are crooks looking to case out locations to rob.
Costa Rica’s labor is good, however, one must understand how the labor laws work, otherwise you may find yourself in court. Read more... (926 words, 1 image, estimated 3:42 mins reading time)
