Vioxx/Cox-2 Litigation Conference Speaker Profiles

Steven J. Skikos is a partner at Lopez, Hodes, Restaino, Milman and Skikos. He has been the managing partner of the firm's San Francisco Office since 1996.

Steve has litigated and tried numerous employment, personal injury and pharmaceutical cases and heads up case specific work in numerous pharmaceutical mass tort litigations that the firm is now involved in. In addition, Steve has served in leadership positions in both MDL and California coordinated litigations, including the following:

Liaison Counsel in the California Coordinated Baycol Litigation

Co-Liaison Counsel in the California Coordinated Rezulin Litigation

Co-Liaison Counsel in the California Coordinated PPA Litigation

Member of the Science and Expert Committee of the Rezulin MDL

Steve graduated from Hastings College of Law in 1990 where he was Executive Publications Editor of the Hastings International and Comparative Law Review and recipient of the Hastings 1066 Scholar Award. He received his undergraduate degree, with honors, from the University of Notre Dame in 1987.

Steve is a member of the State Bar of California, San Francisco Bar Association, Association of Trial Lawyers of America (ATLA), Consumer Attorneys of California (CAOC), San Francisco Trial Lawyers Association, National College of Advocacy, and the Hellenic Law Society. He is a frequent speaker at bar association and Mealey's conferences on issues relating to pharmaceutical mass tort litigation.









Mark P. Robinson, Jr. is the senior partner with Robinson, Calcagnie & Robinson in Newport Beach, California. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Stanford University and graduated cum laude from Loyola School of Law.

Mr. Robinson has devoted his legal career to product safety, and has been counsel or co-counsel in cases in over 20 states. He has handled hundreds of product liability cases, including the landmark Ford Pinto case of Grimshaw vs. Ford Motor Company with his partner Art Hews, in which the jury awarded $128 million in compensatory and punitive damages.

Some of his other significant trials include Ketchum vs. Hyundai, where a Los Angeles County jury awarded $15 million to a young boy who was paralyzed and brain-damaged in a freeway collision due to a defective seatbelt system; Oliver vs. Nissan, a $9 million verdict in a crashworthiness case in Los Angeles County; Siu v. General Motors, which resulted in a $9 million judgment in San Diego County; and the Carrollton, Kentucky, school bus crash. He was also co-trial counsel in Anderson v. General Motors, which resulted in a $4.9 billion verdict in Los Angeles County.

Mr. Robinson was elected to serve in 1999 as President of the Consumer Attorneys of California (CAOC), formerly the California Trial Lawyers Association. In 1996 and 1978 he was honored as "Personal Injury Trial Lawyer of the Year" by the Orange County Trial Lawyers Association. Mr. Robinson has served as a Board Member of the Association of Trial Lawyers of America (ATLA), the National Board of the American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA), the Association of Business Trial Lawyers Orange County Chapter, the Attorneys Information Exchange Group (AIEG), and the International Society of Barristers. He is past President of the Orange County Trial Lawyers Association, and in 2001 he served as President of the Orange County Bar Association Charitable Fund. He has also served as Lawyer Representative to the 9th Circuit Judicial Conference (1999-2002), and is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers. He is a founding member of Trial Lawyers for Public Justice and Attorneys Information Exchange Group as well as a member of the Institute for Injury Reduction.

In 1999 Mr. Robinson was selected as one of the "Lawyers of the Year" by California Lawyer Magazine. In 2001, California Law Business named him one of the top ten "Most Influential Lawyers in California," according to a survey of attorneys.