Elizabeth Crawford

Elizabeth Crawford’s career as a trial lawyer started at the Pennsylvania Supreme Court as a clerk for a justice for a year before beginning at Kline & Specter. Five and a half years later, in 2019, Crawford was promoted as partner at Kline & Specter after winning hundreds of millions of dollars in verdicts and settlements on behalf of clients and obtaining a record verdict as lead counsel.

Most recently, in December 2023, Crawford, as lead counsel, negotiated a $19.5 million settlement in medical malpractice litigation in Delaware County, Pa., that involved a college student who suffered a brain injury caused by an allegedly mistreated infection.

Earlier in the same year, she was lead counsel in a case that resulted in an eight-figure settlement in a medical malpractice case in New Jersey for a man who suffered paralysis after a spinal surgery.

In 2022, Crawford, again as lead counsel, achieved a $19 million dollar settlement in a medical malpractice case in Pennsylvania for a child who suffered a brain injury at birth. In the same year, she achieved an $8 million dollar settlement in a train accident case, a $9 million dollar settlement in a medical malpractice case for a child who suffered a brain injury at birth, and another eight-figure settlement in an aviation case. In total, Crawford’s victories in 2022 exceed $50 million dollars.

As lead counsel she won a $4.7 million medical malpractice verdict, one of the largest malpractice verdicts in Montgomery County, Pa. This was a rare victory for a plaintiff in a hotly contested case involving the credibility of a patient’s word versus a physician’s word.

Crawford, again as lead counsel, has obtained multi-million-dollar settlements for clients against the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Hershey Medical Center, and Geisinger Medical Center in challenging medical malpractice cases.

She was co-counsel in securing a $7 million settlement in Delaware County, a $5 million settlement in Monroe County, and a $5 million settlement on behalf of a young woman who died as a result of a Philadelphia hospital’s negligence.

Crawford was also involved in a record settlement against the City of Philadelphia in 2016 for violation of the 14th Amendment (State-Created Danger) and intentional infliction of emotional distress for an action against the city and police for arrest and release of a young woman in a high crime area leading to sexual assault and rape. In a published decision in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the court denied summary judgment on the 14th Amendment claim, the qualified immunity claim, and the claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress.

Crawford is currently involved as a member of the Plaintiffs’ Executive Committee for victims who died aboard Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302. In that Boeing Max 8 litigation, Crawford, along with Shanin Specter, represents the estates of a U.S. global health analyst, a U.S. physician and a United Nations environmentalist who suffered and perished in the crash.

Crawford has also successfully litigated helicopter crash cases. In one, litigated with Tom Kline, the result was an eight-figure settlement. She also currently represents several families of babies who sustained severe hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy secondary to obstetrician and gynecologist negligence and has obtained eight-digit settlements on behalf of these brain-injured babies. 

Crawford was named a Pennsylvania Super Lawyers Rising Star from 2019-2024, designating her among the top 2.5 percent of attorneys 40 years or younger in the state. She is also a member of the National Trial Lawyers “Pennsylvania Top 40 Under 40” and was named by Best Lawyers in America 2024 among its "Ones to Watch," which recognizes lawyers who are earlier in their careers for their outstanding professional excellence in private practice. In 2021, Crawford was featured in the Thomas R. Kline School of Law’s ‘Alumnae Rising’ series.

She is also a member of the Pennsylvania Trial Lawyers Association, Future Leaders Committee, and the executive committee of the Young Lawyer Division as a liaison from the Philadelphia Trial Lawyers Association. Crawford is obtaining training to become a volunteer lawyer for the Support Center for Child Advocates and participates and donates to the annual toy drive.

While in law school, Crawford obtained the award for the Best Student Performance in trial advocacy, criminal law, and contract law. Crawford completed her undergraduate degree at Loyola College, where she graduated magna cum laude.

Elizabeth Crawford in the news: