Connect AI assistants to JUDY
The JUDY MCP server brings JUDY's case law and legislation search straight into the AI assistants you already use — Claude, Claude Code, and any other client that speaks the Model Context Protocol (MCP).
Instead of switching between your AI chat and judy.legal, you can ask your assistant to search African case law and legislation — by keyword or in plain language — and pull up AI-generated case analysis, all grounded in JUDY's curated legal database. Every result links back to judy.legal so you can read the full decision and verify the source.
JUDY MCP is a Plus feature. Connecting AI assistants over MCP is available on the Plus plan. See Pricing to upgrade.
What is MCP?
The Model Context Protocol (MCP) is an open standard that lets AI assistants connect to live external data sources and tools, and act on them in real time. Rather than relying only on what a model was trained on, an MCP-connected assistant can call out to a service — like JUDY — to fetch up-to-date, authoritative information in the middle of a conversation.
JUDY runs a remote MCP server at https://mcp.judy.legal. Once you connect and authorize it, your assistant gains a set of JUDY tools it can use on your behalf.
What you can do
With JUDY connected, you can ask your AI assistant to:
- Search case law by keyword — party names, citations, specific terms; with country, court and year filters. Ghana, Nigeria and Kenya have full coverage; other jurisdictions have selected content.
- Search case law by natural language — conceptual or topical queries in plain language (e.g. "when can a contract be voided for unconscionability?"). Requires a country (Ghana, Kenya or Nigeria).
- Search legislation by keyword — find a specific Act or statutory term, with work metadata and matched highlights.
- Search legislation by natural language — topical statute discovery in plain language; requires a country (Ghana, Kenya or Nigeria).
- Get AI case analysis — a structured breakdown of a case's summary, facts, issues, holding, ratio and obiter, in concise or detailed form.
- Build legal workflows — chain these together, e.g. "find the leading Kenyan cases on adverse possession, summarise each, and draft a research note."
Requirements
- An active Plus subscription on your JUDY account. When you connect, you'll be asked to sign in to JUDY and approve access; accounts without Plus are prompted to upgrade.
- An MCP-capable client. JUDY works with Claude (Desktop and web), Claude Code, and other clients that support remote MCP servers over HTTP.
Connecting Claude Code
Add JUDY as an HTTP MCP server from your terminal:
claude mcp add --transport http JUDY https://mcp.judy.legal
The first time the server is used, Claude Code opens JUDY's branded consent screen in your browser. Sign in, review the access being requested, and approve. The JUDY tools then become available in your session.
Connecting Claude Desktop and claude.ai
On claude.ai, open Customize from the sidebar, then go to Connectors (claude.ai/customize/connectors). On Claude Desktop, open Settings → Connectors.
- Choose Add custom connector.
- Enter the JUDY MCP server URL:
https://mcp.judy.legal - Save, then click Connect and complete the JUDY sign-in and consent flow in the window that opens.
Once connected, JUDY's tools appear in the connectors menu and Claude can call them when relevant.
Connecting other MCP clients
Any client that supports remote MCP servers over streamable HTTP can connect using the same URL:
https://mcp.judy.legal
The server uses OAuth with dynamic client registration and PKCE, so most clients only need the URL — they walk you through JUDY sign-in and consent automatically.
Available tools
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
| search_cases_via_keywords | Keyword case-law search (lexical / Elasticsearch). Best for specific terms, party names or citations. Returns JELR citation metadata, highlight snippets and AI-generated analysis. Supports country, court and year filters. |
| search_cases_via_natural_language | Semantic case-law search using vector embeddings. Best for conceptual queries in plain language. Country required (Ghana, Kenya or Nigeria). Returns ranked cases with matched snippets and citation metadata. |
| search_legislation_via_keywords | Keyword legislation and statute search. Best when the user names a specific Act or term. Returns titles, work metadata and matched highlight snippets. |
| search_legislation_via_natural_language | Semantic legislation search using vector embeddings. Best for topical queries in plain language. Country required (Ghana, Kenya or Nigeria). Returns ranked statutes with matched snippets and work metadata. |
| get_case_insight | AI-generated analysis for a single case — summary, facts, issues, holding, ratio and obiter — plus citation metadata. Pass variant: "concise" or "detailed". First call for a case may take longer if analysis is generated on demand. |
All tools are read-only. They never return full judgment or statute text — only citation metadata, matched snippets and AI analysis. Your assistant links back to judy.legal for the full document.
What the assistant can and can't access
JUDY MCP is built privacy-first:
- Your access governs everything. Searches run against JUDY using your own authorization — the assistant can only reach what your JUDY account can.
- The server stores nothing. It holds no long-lived credentials and keeps no copy of your data; each request is forwarded to JUDY using the token you authorized.
- Read-only. Every tool searches or reads analysis. Nothing in your JUDY account can be changed through MCP.
Example prompts
Once connected, try asking your assistant:
- "Search JUDY for Nigerian Supreme Court cases on the doctrine of estoppel since 2015 and summarise the leading ones."
- "Find Kenyan cases about when a contract can be voided for unconscionability."
- "Find Kenyan legislation on data protection and list the key statutes."
- "Give me JUDY's detailed analysis of this case — its issues, holding and ratio."
Managing and revoking access
You authorize JUDY MCP per client through the consent screen. To stop a client from accessing JUDY, remove the connector in that client (for Claude Code, run claude mcp remove JUDY). Because the server stores no long-lived credentials, removing the connection ends its access.
Need help?
If you have trouble connecting, confirm that your JUDY plan includes MCP access (Plus) and that you completed the sign-in and consent step. For anything else, reach out to our team at hello@judy.legal.