Short answer. Article 2002 excuses the hotel-keeper in two situations: when the loss is due to the acts of the guest, the guest's family, servants, or visitors, or when the loss arises from the character of the things the guest brought into the hotel. Outside those two situations, the exemption does not apply.
What the law says
The hotel-keeper is not liable for compensation if the loss is due to the acts of the guest, his family, servants or visitors, or if the loss arises from the character of the things brought into the hotel.
Civil Code, Article 2002 — When the Hotel-Keeper Is Not Liable. Read the full provision →
Two, and only two, escape routes
Article 2002 identifies exactly two grounds on which a hotel-keeper is not liable for a guest's loss: the loss is due to the acts of the guest, his family, servants or visitors, or the loss arises from the character of the things brought into the hotel. Being written as an exemption from an otherwise-existing liability, the article implies that a hotel-keeper is ordinarily answerable for loss, and escapes that liability only where one of these two situations is shown.
When the loss traces back to the guest's own circle
The first ground covers loss caused by the acts of the guest, his family, servants or visitors. This is not limited to the guest's own conduct — it reaches the guest's family members, the guest's servants, and people visiting the guest as well. If the loss can be traced to the acts of someone within that circle, rather than to any failing on the hotel's part, the hotel-keeper is not liable for it under this article.
When the loss comes from the nature of the item itself
The second ground is different in character: the loss arises from the character of the things brought into the hotel. This points not to anyone's conduct but to the nature of the property itself — something about what the item is, or how it is inherently prone to being lost, damaged, or diminished, independent of anything the hotel did or failed to do to safeguard it.
What this exemption does not cover
Because Article 2002 names only these two specific grounds, a loss that does not fit either one is not automatically excused. A loss caused by a stranger with no connection to the guest, or by the hotel's own staff acting outside the guest's circle, or by ordinary carelessness in how the hotel secured the property, does not fall within either of the two grounds this article sets out — and so the exemption it provides does not apply to it. A loss caused jointly by the hotel's negligence and the guest's own carelessness is not resolved by this article either, since it names only the two specific grounds above.