Name: Deborah Chang
Item: Deborah Chang
Author: chang

Bio

Deborah Chang is a Los Angeles personal injury trial attorney with Panish Shea & Boyle LLP and focuses her practice representing plaintiffs in complex torts, catastrophic injury, wrongful death, product liability, sexual assault/abuse/harassment/discrimination, and business tort cases.

Licensed to practice in California, Florida and Connecticut, Ms. Chang and her trial teams have obtained some of the largest verdicts and settlements on record and has been involved in some of the most significant and lengthiest trials in Los Angeles, including the Michael Jackson wrongful death case and the first ASR model hip implant trial tried in the country. Many of her cases of first impression led to significant changes in industry standards and practices that improved safety for the public. In Cuthbertson v. LACMTA, for example, a record $17 million wrongful death verdict ensured that visually impaired patrons using trains would be protected against falling in the gap between rail cars. The verdict was important not only to the LACMTA, but to all transportation authorities nationwide.

Likewise, in Rosen v. The Regents of the University of California, Ms. Chang was an integral part of an eight-year battle in the trial court, the Court of Appeals, and the California Supreme Court in a case of first impression that affects every university and college student in the state. In that case, the Plaintiff, a pre-med student at UCLA, was slashed across the throat and stabbed multiple times by a classmate who had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. The California Supreme Court, in a unanimous decision, determined that universities and colleges have a duty to protect its students from known dangers in the classroom.

IFor her work, Ms. Chang has been received the 2019 California Lawyer Attorney of the Year (CLAY) Award in the area of Personal Injury, Consumer Attorneys of California (CAOC) Consumer Attorney of the Year Award in 2014, and was a finalist for that award in 2012, 2016, and 2017. She has been repeatedly recognized and selected for inclusion by the Daily Journal as one of the Top Women Lawyers in California, one of the Top Plaintiff Lawyers in California, and one of the Top 100 Lawyers in California. In 2017, she received the CAOC Women’s Caucus Women Consumer Advocate of the Year Award for outstanding commitment to furthering the education and careers of women trial lawyers.

In 2018, Ms. Chang was selected as an Elite Trial Lawyer, one out of only nine women trial lawyers throughout the country who were recipients of this recognition in the “Elite Women of the Plaintiffs Bar” category. The Elite Trial Lawyer winners were chosen by editors and reporters from ALM and The National Law Journal who reviewed over 300 submissions across 23 categories to find finalists “who have demonstrated exemplary performance in cutting-edge work on behalf of plaintiffs over the last 18 months.”

She has also been selected for inclusion in Super Lawyers for Southern California and Best Lawyers in America, and has been recognized as a “Top Attorney” by periodicals such as Pasadena Magazine. She has achieved a perfect 10 out of 10 Avvo rating for her exceptional services as a Top Attorney.

Ms. Chang currently serves on the Executive Committee of the CAOC and is currently the Second Vice-President and Membership Chair. She is also a member (Associate Rank) of the Los Angeles Chapter of the American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA), and serves on its Executive Committee. She is a National Board Member of ABOTA, a member of the Membership Committee, and is the Chair of the Sponsorship Committee, and previously served as the Co-Chair of its Masters in Trial (MIT) Program. She is also a Fellow of the ABOTA Foundation (Legacy-Ratifier).

She is also actively involved with the Consumer Attorneys Association of Los Angeles (CAALA), and is a member of and frequent speaker for the American Association of Justice (AAJ). She currently serves on the Diversity Committee for AAJ as a representative for California. She is also a Fellow with the Litigation Counsel of America (LCA), a trial lawyer honorary society composed of less than one-half of one percent of American lawyers. Additionally, Ms. Chang serves on the Board of “Fund Her”, a newly-launched political action committee dedicated to achieving gender parity in California politics that is cited as one of the reasons for a huge state and national rise in both women candidates and women donors.

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