Medical Malpractice and Personal Injury Trial Attorneys

1. The next Corboys: Rising stars of
Chicago's personal injury bar
By Steven R. Strahler, September 16, 2013
Craig Mannarino, Partner
Kralovec Jambois & Schwartz
60 W. Randolph, 4th Fl.
Chicago, Illinois 60601
312-782-5236
Craig Mannarino will gladly
take you to trial.
Last year, the Kralovec
Jambois & Schwartz partner
demanded $2 million for
misdiagnosis of a fungal
infection. The defense balked
at settling. The jury's verdict,
now on appeal: $3.2 million.
Two years ago, he sought $3
million on behalf of a man
injured in a trench collapse that
killed his father. Verdict: $8.6
million, upheld last month on
appeal.
In 2010, he won $1.75 million
after seeking $450,000 for loss
of an eye after glaucoma
surgery.
Mr. Mannarino, 44, doesn't win
them all, but when he does it
can be by a good margin.
Some awards, of course,
shrink in post-trial settlements,
such as the $12.7 million he
secured in 2007 related to a
fatal shooting by Chicago
police.
The $3 million settlement,
though, was three times what
city attorneys initially had
offered.
Medical malpractice claims
tend to go to trial more
frequently than other personal
injury cases, he says: “Doctors
are more apt to defend their
conduct. They know, overall,
the statistics favor them at
trial.” Moreover, without
adequate preparation, a
plaintiff's attorney “can very
easily be embarrassed at trial
by a skilled physician.”
Yet, like many of his peers, on
behalf of his clients Mr.
Mannarino will settle three or
four cases for each one he
tries. He has two on the docket
this fall.
The lanky Connecticut native,
who clerked at a Washington
law firm before enrolling at
DePaul University's law school,
is the antithesis of a
flamboyant trial attorney. He
worked at a Chicago defense
firm known today as Cassiday
Schade LLP before joining
Kralovec, where he had
clerked during law school.
Kralovec doesn't do late-night
TV ads— “We barely have a
functioning website,” he says.
The secret is work, work,
work—“I'm not going to wow
people with a 'Columbo'
moment at trial,” says Mr.
Mannarino, who confesses to
a bit of lingering
stage fright: “I'm now less
nervous than the jurors.”