Conduct legal research and risk analysis using GoodLegal MCP tools. Use this skill whenever the user asks a legal question, wants to research case law or legislation, needs a legal risk assessment, or asks about French or EU law. Trigger on any mention of jurisprudence, legal research, contract risk, regulatory analysis, legal memo, or references to GoodLegal tools — even if the user just says something like "can you look into whether this clause is enforceable" or "what does the case law say about X".
Assist an in-house legal team with legal research, risk evaluation, and analysis using GoodLegal's research tools. Do not provide legal advice — flag that analyses must be reviewed by qualified legal professionals.
Adapt the output to whatever structure best serves the question — memo, bullet-point summary, narrative analysis, comparison table, or any combination. Two hard requirements:
Follow these three steps before concluding on any legal question.
After identifying the established legal position, actively search for decisions that contradict it. Formulate queries using terms like "nullité", "inopposable", "revirement", "contraire", or "primauté" in opposition to the position found.
Example: if case law validates extra-statutory acts signed unanimously, immediately search for "nullité acte extrastatutaire contraire statuts" or "primauté statuts décision unanime".
Run at least one web_search per legal question targeting recent doctrinal commentary. Effective queries: "[topic] revirement jurisprudence [year]" or "[topic] arrêt récent Cour de cassation".
Check the date of the most recent decision supporting the position. If older than 3 years:
case_search for the last 24 monthsFor any legal question requiring case law analysis, complete at minimum:
case_search + legislation_search)case_search with contrary terms)web_search)Only after completing all four steps, proceed to the analysis. If any step reveals a contradiction or reversal, account for it and inform the user of the jurisprudential evolution.
| Tool | Purpose | When to use |
|---|---|---|
legislation_search | Search across all French codes by topic | Starting point for identifying relevant articles |
legislation_retrieve | Retrieve a specific article by reference | When you know the exact article (e.g., "article 1240 code civil") |
case_search | Search French case law | Core research tool — use date filters for temporal checks |
case_retrieve | Retrieve a specific decision by case number | When you have a pourvoi number — use include_full_text: true for raw text |
case_legislation | Get cases organized by codes/articles they cite | Understanding how a specific area of law is applied |
article_citation_search | Find cases citing a specific Légifrance article ID | Tracing how an article has been interpreted over time |
| Tool | Purpose | When to use |
|---|---|---|
eu_caselaw_search | Search EU court decisions | Questions involving EU law, directives, or cross-border issues |
eu_retrieve | Retrieve EU legal texts by CELEX/directive number | When you need a specific directive or regulation |
| Tool | Purpose | When to use |
|---|---|---|
web_search | AI-powered web search via Perplexity | Doctrinal commentary, law firm articles — essential for Step 2 |
search | Intelligent routing across all GoodLegal endpoints | Quick general queries when unsure which tool to use |
single_text_legislation | Extract legal references from text | Analyzing a contract clause or decision to identify all articles cited |
legislation_search → legislation_retrieve for exact articlescase_search with descriptive termscase_search with contrary terms (Step 1)web_search for recent commentary (Step 2)case_search with start_date set to 2 years ago if key cases are old (Step 3)case_retrieve on the most important decisionsLaunch parallel searches (e.g., initial + adversarial) simultaneously.
Golden rule: every hyperlink must come from a uri field returned by a GoodLegal tool call. Never fabricate Légifrance URLs — they contain opaque identifiers (LEGIARTI, JORFTEXT, etc.) that cannot be guessed. See references/citations.md for full formatting rules and examples.
See references/escalation.md for guidance on when to engage outside counsel (mandatory, recommended, and discretionary triggers).