Pursuing justice no matter the cost

For 46 years, personal injury attorney David Elk and his firm Elk & Elk have won more million dollar plus settlements over the last ten years than any other firm in the state of Ohio

By Jonathan Widran

Having represented thousands of medical malpractice and wrongful death victims throughout his home state of Ohio over the past 46 years, David Elk confidently offers an affirmative “yes” to the many provocative questions he poses to prospective clients on the website of his firm Elk & Elk.

In delineating what separates a good Ohio lawyer from a superior Ohio lawyer, he asks the following: How many multimillion-dollar cases have they won? Will they take my case to trial or simply look to settle it? Are they favored by groups like Ohio Super Lawyers Magazine and Avvo.com? Can they take on big companies and multibillion-dollar insurance firms? Do they charge any up-front fees? Do they staff their own doctors, nurses, accountants, reconstructionists and investigators? Do they have the financial resources to hire the leading experts in the country?

Driven by the vision and commitment of David and his brother Art Elk, Elk & Elk—which has offices in Mayfield Heights, Cincinnati and Columbus–has won for its clients more million-dollar-plus results in the last ten years than any other firm in the state. Their areas of practice include personal injury cases (auto, motorcycle, semi/truck, aviation and railroad accidents, plus product defect and workers’ comp); medical malpractice (birth injury, emergency room, surgical and medication errors, anesthesia mistakes, wrongful death and nursing home neglect); drug and device recalls (everything from Accutane and Crestor to DePuy Hip System and Propecia Advisory); and employment claims (wage & hour violations, FELA railroad injuries, Social Security, Workers’ Comp and more)

Elk & Elk also helps investment fraud victims with resources that help bring shady financial advisors to justice. For these matters, the firm offers in-house accountants, economists and other financial experts who can identify what the client is owed and who will fight to secure those funds.

As an extension of his thriving practice, David Elk takes an active role in teaching other lawyers how to better represent their injury clients in today’s ever changing legal system. This includes lecturing at seminars for the Ohio Trial Lawyers Association on litigation and injury issues. His professional associations include the Ohio, Cleveland, Summit, Lake and Cuyahoga County Trial Lawyers Association, as well as the American Association of Justice (AAJ).

“Our practice has no billable hours,” Elk says. “We only take on cases where we see real merit and feel confident that we can secure a just settlement or verdict for our client. We tell everyone up front that it will never cost them a dime for us to determine if they have a claim worth pursuing. If we are successful, the experts we employ to testify on the merits of a case get a fee that’s part of the settlement. If they conclude there is no case, we simply give that case back to the client and absorb those case costs as a cost of doing business. I’ve worked with thousands of clients over the years and realize that in essence they all want the same thing—to be treated honestly and fairly. If there is a disputed case as to who is at fault and we think the client could lose in court and get nothing, we may suggest a compromise settlement.

“Generally, the client should always walk away with more than the lawyer,” he adds. “If they’re not happy with how the numbers crunch, I will consider cutting my fee – just because I want the client to walk away satisfied. Because it’s not about money, it’s about doing what is right for the client. The money comes if you treat people right and work hard for them.”

Elk illustrates his philosophy with the story of a case that he took on not long after he ambitiously launched his own practice after seven years with one of Ohio’s top personal injury law firms. His client was three months behind in his rent and was about to be evicted. Elk’s goal was to have the court grant “Bill” a few weeks grace time for him to find another place, so that he, his wife and two kids would not be put onto the street.

When Elk was successful, his client thanked him, pulled out his checkbook and began writing him a check. Elk knew that the client wasn’t working at the time and told him instead that he could send him the money when he had it. “He never paid me, but two months later, I got a phone call from a woman whose husband was injured in a terrible explosion,” Elk says. “She had been referred to me by Bill. It was a classic workers’ comp and third party claim and his injuries were serious. It was the 70's and in those days the limits of insurance was $300,000 – which was a lot more then than it is now. That’s the number we settled for, and it was huge for both my client and me at the time. I realized that if I did right by people and treated them fairly, people would refer business to me. Planting seeds like that is all part of building a successful practice.”

Even after all these years, Elk loves taking on challenging cases that he believes many in his position would simply dismiss as unworthy of such efforts. Not long ago, Elk settled a case for a man who was on total disability from an accident 30 years ago. He was in a recent auto accident when he had turned left in front of a tow truck driver and sustained serious injuries involving multiple fractures to his right leg and ankle. The tow truck operator claimed he had the green light, and Elk’s client claimed he had a left turn arrow. The police did not know who was at fault, but Elk’s investigator found a witness who saw the tow truck driver go through the red light. A vocational expert was hired to project future medical costs and home modification costs to establish projected expenses.

“We mediated that case and ultimately settled it. We were able to set up a tax free annuity for the man’s two grandchildren that guarantees a college education, as well as tax free monthly payments for the rest of my client’s life.”

Elk says, “The other side was not happy with what they paid, but I feel good about helping a nice client who deserved to be fairly compensated.”

“For me, as someone who has devoted his life to personal injury law, there is no better feeling than knowing I have helped someone through a terrible crisis and made an important difference in their lives,” he adds. “When a client shakes my hand after signing the final settlement and says ‘Thank you so much for helping,’ it’s just something I’ll never forget. Nothing is more gratifying than that.”

Aside from an astounding success rate for their clients and a personal hands-on approach, two other factors distinguish Elk & Elk: the fact that at heart it is a family run business and the great outreach they do and commitment they have to numerous charitable organizations throughout Ohio. On the family side, David Elk’s brother Art joined the firm in 1984 after ten years as a prosecutor; Art had been elected Ashland County’s Prosecuting Attorney for two successive four year terms and at one point was the youngest prosecuting attorney in the state of Ohio. David’s wife Marilyn works as the firm’s CFO and is in charge of the distribution of all settlements, and his daughter Mindy is a CPA and is also a lawyer in the firm.

For the past five years, Elk & Elk has donated thousands of turkeys to the St. Augustine Hunger Center, which serves 6,000 meals at holiday time to weather caused shut-ins and homeless people. In the summer months, the firm is involved with the Achievement Center of greater Cleveland, which runs Camp Cheerful, a camp for handicapped children; Elk & Elk helps sponsor a race in June which raises money so that these children can attend camp. They are also part of None for Under 21, a Northeast Ohio program that helps educate children about the dangers of drinking and driving. David has spoken at their events, which often includes bringing in prisoners who are serving time for injuring or killing people because of drunk driving. Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) is one of the sponsors as well. Each year, Elk & Elk offers a $2,000 award to the high school who artistically creates the best poster against driving while drinking or on drugs.

“We’re hoping to educate young people to stop them from making this terrible mistake,” Elk says. “It’s an extension of our desire to help people and we apply the same tenacity to help others via these causes as we do to our clients in the office. Whatever it costs to bring justice to them, we’re committed to doing the right thing. We have the same respect of other attorneys and insurance companies throughout the state – and they tend to treat our clients fairly because if they don’t, they know we’ll take each case all the way until justice is done.”