David Malik
Attorney and Founder
As founder of Malik Law, David is personally involved with every lawsuit his firm represents – suits that often give civil rights offenses national exposure. Although these cases are frequently large in scope, he’s kept his firm small by design. This allows David to give clients more direct, personal attention and take on cases where the civil rights violation is clear, but a winning verdict may seem impossible.
We don’t care about what’s seemingly impossible, we care about what is right.
“We once represented a cocaine addict who died in jail because he was ignored by jail personnel and medical staff. Nobody on the defense thought his life was worth much. We took on that case against all odds. We felt we would be able to demonstrate that his mother’s grief was so real and no different than the grief of a mother whose son was an all-American athlete. The suit went from a low five-figure offer to a high six-figure resolution”. Everyone else had turned this case down. We validated to everyone involved, mom’s true love for her son”.
Sometimes the wrong path takes you in the right direction.
After high school, David thought medicine might be his calling; he spent a summer auditing classes at Harvard Medical School where he realized – he was in the wrong place. The experience however showed him how varied life was in the city vs. the suburbs of Ohio where he grew up. “I’d walk through some of the roughest neighborhoods of Boston on my way to the school and the hospital where I also worked. Over time people recognized ‘the guy in a white lab coat,’ and I made a number of friends on my journey back and forth. I also realized there were a lot of problems – drugs, violence. I’d hear the gunshots. I often thought – what can I do to make a difference?”
David decided to focus his undergraduate work on Urban Studies, where he learned that if he wanted to affect change he needed to get closer to policy. Becoming an attorney gave him this chance, and he returned to Cleveland to study law and open his independent law practice right after graduation.
The best part of my day is the relationships I make.
One of the most surprising things about David is that clients seldom get his voicemail. He sees his job as a collaborative effort with his clients – one that’s based on trust, returned phone calls and honesty. Collaboration is also what drives David outside the office. He’s still in school – flight school, climbing school and music school specifically. “I’m a big believer in those teaching relationships; they add to the richness of my life and help me understand things on a deeper level. The older I get, the more I realize the less I know.”