/demand-draft

1. Load ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/demand-letters/[slug]/intake.md. Refuse if missing or strategic block empty (for material demands).
2. Load ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/CLAUDE.md → demand-letter practice, house style, seed-doc table.
3. Follow the workflow and reference below.
4. Run the pre-draft gate: privilege filter, admission risk, accord-and-satisfaction, FRE 408 posture, waiver scan, tone, factual accuracy. Do not proceed until each is engaged.
5. Template select: seed doc if provided in ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/CLAUDE.md; else soft template for the demand type.
6. Draft in-chat for review. Iterate until user approves.
7. Write ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/demand-letters/[slug]/draft-v[N].docx using the docx skill.
8. Write ~/.claude/plugins/config/claude-for-legal/litigation-legal/demand-letters/[slug]/checklist.md (post-send checklist).
9. Assess materiality per heuristic; offer to create a matter. If yes: hand off to matter-intake with pre-populated fields.

Demand Draft

Purpose

Take a completed intake and produce a sendable draft. Most of the value is in refusing to draft until privilege, waiver, admission, and settlement-communication posture have been consciously addressed — the failure mode is a letter that waives privilege or constitutes an admission because no one paused to check.

Record fidelity — quotes and pinpoints

Demand letters are advocacy, and every quoted line from a contract, an email, or a prior communication becomes an assertion the counterparty will test. Canonical statement in the plugin's CLAUDE.md shared guardrails; repeated here.

Verbatim quotes must be verbatim. Never put quotation marks around words attributed to the counterparty, their counsel, a witness, or any document unless you have the exact passage in front of you. When you want to characterize without the exact words:

• Paraphrase without quotation marks, with a placeholder: "Your [date] email stated X [verify exact quote — email cite pending]."
• Never fill the gap. A misquoted contract provision in a demand letter is the fastest way to lose credibility with opposing counsel on the first round.
• Every [verify exact quote] must be flagged in the reviewer note before the letter leaves.

Pinpoint cites must support the whole proposition. If the demand asserts "Section 4.2 requires payment within 30 days upon invoice receipt," the cited section must cover the obligation AND the trigger AND the window. If it only covers one, split the cite (e.g., "Section 4.2 (payment obligation); Section 4.3 (30-day window)") or narrow the proposition. A contract cite that backs part of the demand is how the counterparty replies with the full text and flips the posture.

Candor about weak arguments

When the law or the record is against a point, don't dress it up as solid. When an argument in the demand is weak — the contract language is ambiguous, the authority cuts the other way, the damages theory is a stretch — flag it for the sender:

"The [claim / theory] here is weak because [authority / fact]. Options: (a) press it and frame as [alternative framing], (b) drop it and rely on [stronger claim], (c) keep it as a hook but hedge the language. [review — strategic call]."

A demand letter that over-asserts gets a response that catalogs every overreach, shifts leverage, and burns the next round. The strongest demand letter is the one that concedes what's weak so the counterparty can't.

Echo vs repeat

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