Dog Bite Demand Letter - New Mexico

NEW MEXICO ANIMAL-INJURY DEMAND

Evidence, Authority, and Settlement-Offer Development Form

COUNSEL REVIEW REQUIRED BEFORE SENDING. This form deliberately does not
label New Mexico animal liability as strict liability, a one-bite rule, or
negligence. It does not supply a filing deadline, damages rule, venue,
preservation sanction, animal-control outcome, or mandatory response period.
Complete the authority register for the actual facts and delete all internal
instructions from the letter sent to the recipient.

1. Sender and Delivery Record

[ATTORNEY OR FIRM LETTERHEAD]

Date: [__/__/____]

Delivery method:

☐ Email

☐ Mail

☐ Courier

☐ Insurer portal

☐ Other: [METHOD]

Recipient legal name and role: [NAME / ROLE]

Recipient address and email: [ADDRESS / EMAIL]

Insurer, owner, keeper, property controller, public entity, or other recipient:
[CLASSIFICATION]

Claim or reference number: [NUMBER]

Delivery evidence: [TRACKING / RECEIPT / PORTAL RECORD]

Optional counsel-approved settlement legend: [NONE / EXACT TEXT AND AUTHORITY]

2. Matter Identification

Claimant: [FULL LEGAL NAME]

Incident date and time: [DATE / TIME / TIME ZONE]

Incident location: [FULL LOCATION]

Animal description and identifier: [SPECIES / BREED IF DOCUMENTED / COLOR / SIZE / NAME / TAG / MICROCHIP]

Animal owner: [NAME / UNRESOLVED]

Animal keeper or handler: [NAME / UNRESOLVED]

Property owner, tenant, occupier, or manager: [NAME / UNRESOLVED]

Government or animal-control involvement: [AGENCY / CASE NUMBER / NONE KNOWN]

Related criminal, municipal, administrative, civil, or insurance matter:
[DETAILS / NONE KNOWN]

3. Party, Capacity, and Coverage Register

Do not attribute ownership, custody, agency, property control, insurance, or
legal responsibility to a person or entity without supporting facts.

4. Current-Law Authority Register

Complete this table from current primary authority before stating liability,
a deadline, a defense, an entitlement, or a remedy.

A response date in a settlement demand does not change a filing, notice,
presentment, appeal, or other legal deadline unless counsel has verified an
enforceable basis.

5. Incident Narrative and Scene Evidence

5.1 Chronology

Describe the approach, contact, bite, knockdown, pursuit, escape, intervention,
and immediate aftermath without converting assumptions into facts.

Claimant's activity immediately before contact: [________________________________]

Animal's location, restraint, access, and handler: [________________________________]

Entry, gate, door, fence, leash, tether, enclosure, or warning facts: [________________________________]

Lighting, weather, visibility, surface, and layout: [________________________________]

Photographs, video, audio, dispatch, body-camera, or doorbell evidence: [________________________________]

Conflicting accounts: [________________________________]

5.2 Scene Diagram and Measurements

6. Animal History and Notice Evidence

Do not infer dangerous propensity, owner knowledge, or legal notice from breed,
appearance, rumor, or an unverified complaint.

Additional sources to investigate:

☐ Animal-control records

☐ Veterinary records available through a lawful route

☐ Prior incident reports or claims

☐ Neighbor or household witnesses

☐ Training, boarding, shelter, rescue, or adoption records

☐ Leash, fence, enclosure, or property-maintenance records

☐ Texts, emails, social posts, photographs, or videos

☐ Prior warnings, signs, muzzling, restraints, or handling practices

☐ Other: [SOURCE]

Unverified lead that must not appear as fact: [________________________________]

7. Claimant Conduct and Alternative Causes

8. Injury and Treatment Record

Document, as applicable:

☐ Bite, puncture, laceration, crush, fracture, fall, or other physical injury

☐ Infection, vaccination, medication, surgery, or wound care

☐ Scar location, measurements, photographs, and maturation evidence

☐ Nerve, tendon, mobility, strength, or sensory issue

☐ Psychological symptoms and treatment

☐ Work, school, household, caregiving, sleep, recreation, or travel effects

☐ Future-care opinion and factual basis

☐ Prognosis, permanency, impairment, or disfigurement opinion

Separate provider statements from claimant reports and counsel summaries.

9. Economic Loss and Other Claimed Harm

9.1 Medical and Related Expense

9.2 Income and Service Loss

9.3 Non-Economic or Enhanced Claim Development

Do not state that damages are uncapped, automatically recoverable, doubled,
punitive, or subject to a fixed formula without current authority and the
required evidence.

10. Insurance and Recovery Sources

Record without assuming coverage:

☐ Homeowner or renter policy

☐ Commercial general-liability policy

☐ Umbrella or excess policy

☐ Employer or business policy

☐ Property-manager or landlord policy

☐ Public-entity risk program

☐ Reservation of rights or denial

☐ Exclusion, endorsement, self-insured retention, deductible, or erosion issue

☐ Other: [DETAILS]

11. Preservation Request Development

Counsel may add a tailored preservation request after identifying relevant
custodians, systems, devices, date ranges, records, and foreseeable loss risks.

Potential subjects include incident video, photographs, communications,
animal-control and veterinary records, property records, prior-event records,
insurance notices, maintenance records, training records, and physical
features that may change.

Do not threaten an automatic sanction, demand destruction of the animal be
prevented without verified authority, or request privileged or unrelated
material.

12. Settlement Offer Register

Proposed monetary amount: $[________________________________]

Components and calculation: [________________________________]

Payment date and method: [________________________________]

Payees, liens, reimbursements, or approvals: [________________________________]

Nonmonetary terms: [________________________________]

Release scope and excluded claims: [________________________________]

Confidentiality or non-disparagement proposal: [________________________________]

Tax and reporting review: [________________________________]

Policy-limits or coverage-specific wording, if supported: [________________________________]

Offer expiration or withdrawal event: [________________________________]

Authority for any time-limited or coverage-sensitive demand: [________________________________]

13. Draft Demand Letter

[DATE]

[RECIPIENT NAME AND ROLE]

[ENTITY / INSURER]

[ADDRESS / EMAIL]

Re: [CLAIMANT / INCIDENT DATE / CLAIM NUMBER]

Dear [NAME]:

Our office represents [CLAIMANT] concerning the animal incident on
[DATE] at [LOCATION]. Please direct communications about this matter to
[CONTACT], subject to any channel required by an existing proceeding or
agreement.

Relevant Facts

[CONCISE CHRONOLOGY DRAWN FROM THE VERIFIED INCIDENT RECORD. DISTINGUISH
DOCUMENTED FACTS, WITNESS ACCOUNTS, CLIENT RECOLLECTION, AND DISPUTED
INFERENCES.]

Claimant's Position

Based on the completed current-law register, our client contends that
[IDENTIFY ONLY INCLUDED THEORIES, DEFENDANTS, AND FACTS SUPPORTING EACH].

Injury and Loss

The presently documented injury and loss are [SUMMARY WITH RECORD AND
CALCULATION REFERENCES].

Requested Resolution

To explore resolution, our client proposes [MONETARY AND NONMONETARY TERMS].

This proposal remains available until [DATE / EVENT / WRITTEN WITHDRAWAL].
That response date does not alter any legal deadline, defense, procedural
obligation, or coverage term. Please contact [NAME / METHOD] if the
recipient wishes to discuss the proposal.

Sincerely,

[ATTORNEY NAME]

[FIRM]

14. Final Review

☐ Every legal assertion in the outgoing letter appears in the completed
authority register.

☐ Every case, statute, rule, ordinance, instruction, deadline, and remedy was
checked against a current official source.

☐ Owner, keeper, property, employer, public-entity, and insurance roles were
not conflated.

☐ Animal history and notice evidence is firsthand or supported and does not
rely on breed generalizations.

☐ Incident facts, quotations, injuries, treatment, bills, wage loss, and future
opinions match the records.

☐ Defenses, comparative allocation, causation, preexisting conditions, and
mitigation received factual and legal review.

☐ Damages do not assume a cap, multiplier, punitive entitlement, collateral
source result, fee award, or fixed formula.

☐ The response period does not purport to toll or replace a deadline.

☐ The preservation request is tailored to identified evidence and current
authority.

☐ Release, liens, reimbursement, tax, confidentiality, insurance, and
nonmonetary terms received counsel review.

☐ Unused theories, instructions, checklists, and internal work-product tables
were removed from the letter sent to the recipient.