Judge dismisses suit against Dodgers’ Yasiel Puig stemming from human trafficking charges

A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit that blamed Dodgers outfielder Yasiel Puig for the alleged imprisonment and torture of a Cuban man.

The order Monday by U.S. District Judge Kathleen M. Williams in Miami ends almost two years of legal wrangling after Miguel Angel Corbacho Daudinot sued Puig for $12 million.

But Corbacho Daudinot wasn’t able to leave Cuba to participate in pre-trial discovery, despite a series a deadlines that came and went. Last week, his attorneys asked the judge to dismiss the case that had been scheduled for trial in November.

Puig’s attorney, Sean Santini, declined to comment.

Corbacho Daudinot sued under the Torture Victim Protection Act of 1991, which allows civil lawsuits in the United States against people who commit torture while acting in an official capacity for another country. He said that Puig falsely accused him of human trafficking — attempting to help Puig leave Cuba — which led to a seven-year prison sentence in 2010.

Puig, though his attorneys, has repeatedly denied the claims.

Corbacho Daudinot served three and a half years of his sentence in Cuba before being granted a provisional release. But Cuban authorities imprisoned him again for four months before his release in January.

Corbacho Daudinot’s attorneys, who didn’t respond to a request for comment, said last month in a court filing that authorities pulled him from a line boarding a plane to leave Cuba because he was on the country’s no-fly list. That caused Corbacho Daudinot to miss a scheduled deposition in Miami, one of several such instances in the past year.

“The Plaintiff’s testimony is needed to establish the underlying facts of the case,” the court filing said.

No costs or attorneys fees were awarded as part of the dismissal.

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