A civil court in San José has ordered Clifton Neal Orme, the legal representative of Hospital CIMA, to appear in person and testify in a case brought by minority shareholders who say they have spent years trying to recover their investment in one of Costa Rica’s best-known private hospitals.
The order, issued Oct. 20 by the Second Collegiate Civil Court of First Instance is part of a pre-trial evidence proceeding. That type of proceeding gathers testimony and documents before a full lawsuit is filed, and the court has made no finding of wrongdoing. Neal must personally answer the shareholders’ questions as a party to the case and identify and produce any documents put to him.
He must also present an account of his administration, including a detailed list of the company’s assets and liabilities for 2025. The company, registered as Hospital San José S.A., must hand over a certified copy of the minutes of its Feb. 23, 2026, shareholders’ meeting and its financial statements for 2025.
The court warned that if Neal fails to appear without justification, refuses to answer or responds evasively, it may apply article 42.2 of the Civil Procedure Code. Under certain conditions, that provision allows a judge to treat the facts raised in the questioning as true. A hearing set for Oct. 29 was called off because the court had not yet appointed an English interpreter for Neal, who does not speak Spanish. The hospital must deposit 92,660 colones (about $204) to cover four hours of interpretation, and the court will set a new date once the case file is ready.
The proceeding was filed by shareholder Francisco Castro, who holds 17,336 shares. Panacea JSG S.A., a company represented by 79-year-old investor José Jop, joined as an interested party with 528,748 shares, or about 1.91% of the hospital’s capital.
The court rejected the shareholders’ request for a court-appointed expert to audit the company. Their combined stake of about 1.92% falls short of the 10% that article 26 of the Commercial Code requires for that measure, the court ruled, though it granted their other requests for financial and corporate records. Hospital CIMA’s legal representation said the company will comply with whatever the court requires of it through the proper legal channels. Because the matter is ongoing, it said it would not comment on specific proceedings or on the documents requested.
The case is the latest chapter in a long-running dispute between the hospital and its small investors. Sebastián Vargas, the attorney representing Jop, has said the company has more than 5,000 individual and corporate shareholders, some of whom say they have gone more than two decades without a dividend or a way to sell their stakes.
According to audited financial statements cited in local press reports, the company posted cumulative losses of more than 16.9 billion colones (about $37 million at current exchange rates) between 2019 and 2024. Hospital San José S.A. also appears among the large taxpayers that reported losses or zero taxable income to the Finance Ministry for four consecutive fiscal years, from 2021 through 2024.
The same statements show the balance owed to the hospital by International Hospital Corporation (IHC), a Dallas, Texas-based company related to the controlling shareholder, rose from $11.9 million in 2023 to $13.3 million in 2024. IHC designed and built the hospital, which opened in Escazú in 2000 and has long served the country’s medical tourism market.
Only one minority shareholder is known to have won a case against the hospital. In 2023, a court granted physician Manfred Freer the right to withdraw from the company and be paid for his shares, plus dividends, interest and costs, after finding the hospital had recorded profits in two consecutive periods without distributing them. The Supreme Court’s First Chamber upheld that ruling on April 10, 2025.
During that case, the hospital argued that withholding profits reflected a shareholder agreement to reinvest in its operations and maintain quality of care. A court-ordered appraisal later valued each of Freer’s shares at $6.32, against the $1 per share the hospital had maintained. The dispute has also reached the criminal courts. In December 2025, the hospital and Neal filed a criminal complaint for alleged extortion against Jop and Vargas after Jop raised options for recovering his money, including going to the press.
The Pavas Criminal Court dismissed that complaint, and the Specialized Criminal Court for Organized Crime upheld the dismissal on Sept. 30, 2026. Public registry records list Neal as vice president of Hospital San José S.A. and Gary Brent Wood as its president. No new date has been set for Neal’s testimony. Evidence gathered in pre-trial proceedings of this kind is typically used to decide whether to file a full civil lawsuit.
