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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowElevance Health is suing four former executives, claiming the group – who worked as senior leadership for the company in Puerto Rico – breached their contracts by leaving Elevance and immediately joining a competitor in similar roles.
Elevance Health Inc., which has corporate headquarters are in Indianapolis, filed the lawsuit on Jan. 29 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana against Dr. Waldemar C. Ríos Alvarez, Dr. Benjamin Guardiola, Jaime Rivera Pesante and Sara Ramos Gonzalez, all former employees of Elevance Health Puerto Rico.
Each of the defendants are being sued for breach of contract.
The defendants did not immediately respond to messages via Linkedin from The Indiana Lawyer seeking comment.
The Indiana Lawyer has also reached out to attorneys representing Elevance.
According to court documents, each of the defendants received equity awards in their roles in accordance with the 2017 Elevance Health Incentive Compensation Plan, which gives certain executives and senior employees eligibility to receive stock shares.
As senior members of the company, participants in the plan have access to the company’s confidential information and trade secrets, Elevance alleges in court documents. The plan’s participants are not automatically entitled to receive the incentives but must comply with a series of employment agreements, including reasonable confidentiality, non-competition and non-solicitation provisions, according to the complaint.
Under the agreements, the defendants were told that for a period of 12 months following termination of their employment at Elevance, they could not obtain a similar job within the company’s “restricted territory” at a competing company.
Upon each of the defendants’ resignations from Elevance Health Puerto Rico, they allegedly began working in similar roles for a direct competitor, Triple-S Salud, Inc., immediately.
According to court documents, each had worked with the company since 2021 and all four exited the company within a month. Alvarez left Elevance in August 2025, while Guardiola, Rivera, and Ramos left in September 2025.
Triple-S is the largest health insurance company in Puerto Rico and is Elevance Puerto Rico’s direct competitor, according to court documents.
Elevance now claims that because the defendants broke their agreements with the company, the company is now owed the value of their respective equity awards, which the lawsuit claims the company asked the defendants for, but has not yet received.
Elevance is now asking the court to order that the defendants pay the company back, amounting to nearly $1.1 million.
The case is Elevance Health Inc. v. Dr. Waldemar C. Ríos Alvarez, Dr. Benjamin Guardiola, Jaime Rivera Pesante, Dr. Sara Ramos Gonzalez, 1:26-cv-199.
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