Michelle L. Kranz is a founding partner of Zoll & Kranz and a Toledo personal injury lawyer who has represented plaintiffs for more than 30 years.

Since her admission to the Ohio bar in 1993, Michelle has built a practice spanning serious car accidents, truck accidents, catastrophic injuries, wrongful death, product liability, and complex civil litigation.

Based in Toledo, Michelle represents injured people and families in Northwest Ohio while continuing to litigate significant cases in state and federal courts across the country.

Her personal injury practice includes car accidents, motorcycle accidents, truck accidents, brain injuries, wrongful death, and other claims involving serious physical harm.

Her national litigation work includes pharmaceutical and medical-device cases, defective products, toxic exposures, antitrust matters, mass torts, and other cases involving substantial medical, scientific, and corporate evidence.

Michelle has received significant peer recognition for her work on behalf of injured plaintiffs. Best Lawyers has recognized her since 2017 in Personal Injury Litigation – Plaintiffs, Product Liability Litigation – Plaintiffs, and Mass Tort Litigation/Class Actions – Plaintiffs.

She was named Best Lawyers’ Toledo “Lawyer of the Year” for Personal Injury Litigation – Plaintiffs in 2019 and 2023, giving her two separate Lawyer of the Year recognitions in Toledo for plaintiff personal injury litigation.

Best Lawyers also named her Toledo Lawyer of the Year for Mass Tort Litigation/Class Actions – Plaintiffs in 2024 and 2026.

 

A Plaintiff’s Lawyer With Deep Roots in Toledo

Michelle’s connection to Toledo began before her legal career.

After graduating cum laude from Miami University in 1990, she attended the University of Toledo College of Law and earned her Juris Doctor in 1993.

Advocacy became an important part of her legal education.

Her law school experience included moot court and appellate work, including an opportunity to argue before a panel that included Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Thomas Moyer, then-Solicitor General Kenneth Starr, and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor.

More than three decades after graduating, the University of Toledo College of Law named Michelle one of its 2026 Distinguished Alumni.

Michelle remained in Northwest Ohio as she built her practice.

She has spent her entire legal career representing plaintiffs rather than corporations or insurance companies defending injury claims.

Her work in Toledo developed alongside extensive involvement in the local legal community.

Michelle served as President of the Toledo Bar Association from 2015 to 2016.

Her service to the Toledo legal community has also been recognized with two separate Toledo Bar Association awards.

She received the Trustees Award in 2005, which recognizes a younger association member for professionalism and commitment to the legal profession, and the Robert A. Kelb Distinguished Service Award in 2018 for sustained service to the Toledo Bar Association and its members.

Her connection to Northwest Ohio extends beyond her professional work.

Michelle lives in Wood County and has longstanding ties to the region’s agricultural community.

She and her family raise beef cattle and have participated in state and national cattle exhibitions. In 2018, Michelle and her husband were recognized with Wood County’s Friend of 4-H Award for their support of the local 4-H community.

Her experience in rural Northwest Ohio later became relevant to her statewide work addressing access to lawyers in communities where the number of practicing attorneys has declined.

 

Toledo Car Accident and Personal Injury Practice

Michelle represents plaintiffs in personal injury cases involving car accidents, truck accidents, motorcycle crashes, traumatic brain injuries, wrongful death, defective products, and other serious injuries.

Michelle brings decades of plaintiff litigation experience to those disputes.

Michelle’s litigation experience includes working with complex medical and technical evidence, expert witnesses, extensive discovery, disputed causation, and substantial damages claims.

She has represented plaintiffs against corporations, manufacturers, insurers, and other defendants with significant litigation resources.

 

More Than 30 Years of Plaintiff Litigation

Michelle has represented plaintiffs throughout her legal career.

Her cases have involved injuries caused by motor vehicle collisions, medical devices, prescription medications, consumer products, toxic substances, and alleged corporate misconduct.

Many have required the development of medical, scientific, engineering, regulatory, and economic evidence alongside the facts specific to an individual client’s injuries.

Michelle has extensive experience taking and defending depositions, working with expert witnesses, reviewing technical and medical evidence, conducting discovery, evaluating damages, negotiating resolutions, and preparing disputed cases for litigation.

Her practice has also taken her into federal courts throughout the country.

Michelle is admitted to practice before Ohio courts, the U.S. District Courts for the Northern and Southern Districts of Ohio, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, the Sixth and Seventh Circuit Courts of Appeals, and the United States Supreme Court.

Martindale-Hubbell has awarded Michelle an AV Preeminent peer-review rating, its highest peer-rating designation.

 

National Complex Litigation and Court-Appointed Leadership

Michelle has extensive experience in multidistrict litigation, coordinated proceedings, product-liability cases, pharmaceutical litigation, class actions, antitrust matters, and other complex civil cases.

Federal courts have appointed Michelle to leadership positions in major proceedings involving injured plaintiffs.

Those roles have placed her alongside lawyers from across the country in cases requiring coordinated discovery, expert development, motion practice, case management, settlement administration, and communication with large groups of plaintiffs.

Selected leadership roles include:

• East Palestine Train Derailment Litigation: Plaintiffs’ Executive Committee and Liaison Counsel
• Gilead Tenofovir Cases: Plaintiffs’ Executive Committee
• Testosterone Replacement Therapy Products Liability Litigation: Plaintiffs’ Executive Committee and Common Benefit Committee
• DePuy ASR Hip Implant Products Liability Litigation, MDL No. 2197: Plaintiffs’ Liaison Counsel and Settlement Oversight Committee
• Biomet M2a Magnum Hip Implant Litigation, MDL No. 2391: Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee
• Text Messaging Antitrust Litigation, MDL No. 1997: Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee

Michelle has also participated in litigation involving Taxotere, 3M Combat Arms earplugs, transvaginal mesh, Pradaxa, Zoloft, Actos, Zimmer Durom hip implants, Yasmin and Yaz, Heparin, Vioxx, Sulzer orthopedic implants, polyurethane foam antitrust claims, and other pharmaceutical, medical-device, product-liability, and antitrust matters.

Her work in complex litigation has required coordination with physicians, scientists, economists, engineers, regulatory experts, corporate witnesses, and attorneys across multiple jurisdictions.

The underlying focus has remained consistent throughout her career: representing people seeking accountability for serious injuries.

 

Leadership in the Toledo and Ohio Legal Communities

Michelle has held leadership positions at the local, state, and national levels of the legal profession.

She served as President of the Toledo Bar Association from 2015 to 2016.

She later served on the Ohio State Bar Association Board of Governors and Council of Delegates before becoming President of the Ohio State Bar Association for the 2023-2024 term.

During her presidency, Michelle chaired the Ohio State Bar Association’s Rural Practice Gap Task Force.

The task force studied attorney shortages in rural Ohio and developed recommendations addressing recruitment, mentoring, legal education, financial support, and access to legal services in communities with declining numbers of practicing lawyers.

As of August 1, 2026, Michelle serves as President of the National Civil Justice Institute. She is also a Distinguished Life Fellow-Counselor of the Ohio State Bar Foundation and has served as a Trustee of the Foundation.

Her professional service has also included involvement with the Toledo Bar Association, Toledo Bar Foundation, Ohio Association for Justice, American Association for Justice, and other organizations focused on the legal profession and civil justice system.

 

Professional Recognition

Michelle has received recognition for her work in personal injury litigation, product liability, mass torts, complex litigation, and service to the legal profession.

Best Lawyers has recognized her since 2017 in:

• Personal Injury Litigation – Plaintiffs
• Product Liability Litigation – Plaintiffs
• Mass Tort Litigation/Class Actions – Plaintiffs

Her Best Lawyers “Lawyer of the Year” recognitions include:

• Personal Injury Litigation – Plaintiffs, Toledo: 2019
• Personal Injury Litigation – Plaintiffs, Toledo: 2023
• Mass Tort Litigation/Class Actions – Plaintiffs, Toledo: 2024
• Mass Tort Litigation/Class Actions – Plaintiffs, Toledo: 2026

In 2026, the University of Toledo College of Law named Michelle a Distinguished Alumna.

Michelle has also been selected to Ohio Super Lawyers multiple times and was previously selected to Rising Stars.

Martindale-Hubbell has awarded Michelle an AV Preeminent peer-review rating.

The National Trial Lawyers has selected her among its Top 100 lawyers for Ohio West.

Michelle’s service to the Ohio legal profession has also received recognition from the Ohio State Bar Foundation. In 2007, she received the Foundation’s District 4 Community Service Award for Lawyers 40 and Under.

Her service to the Toledo legal community has been recognized by the Toledo Bar Association through the Trustees Award in 2005 and the Robert A. Kelb Distinguished Service Award in 2018.

Outside the legal profession, Michelle and her husband received Wood County’s Friend of 4-H Award in 2018, recognizing their support of 4-H and the local agricultural community.

 

Commitment to Northwest Ohio

Michelle has remained closely connected to Toledo and Northwest Ohio throughout her career.

She attended law school in Toledo, built her practice in the city, and lives in Wood County, where she and her family have longstanding ties to the agricultural community.

Her experience in rural Northwest Ohio has also informed her statewide work addressing shortages of practicing attorneys in smaller Ohio communities.

From our Toledo office, Michelle and the attorneys at Zoll & Kranz represent people injured in car accidents, truck accidents, motorcycle crashes, and other serious incidents throughout Toledo, Lucas County, Wood County, and Northwest Ohio.

Our firm also represents plaintiffs in complex litigation throughout Ohio and across the country.

Damon Williams is a Toledo personal injury lawyer and associate attorney at Zoll & Kranz.

Born and raised in Toledo, Damon represents people injured in car accidents, truck accidents, motorcycle crashes, and other motor vehicle collisions throughout Northwest Ohio.

His practice also includes agricultural law, serious personal injury matters, and complex litigation involving defective drugs and medical devices.

Damon joined Zoll & Kranz as a law clerk before becoming an attorney and spent three years working with our legal team while completing his legal education.

He continued his career with Zoll & Kranz after his admission to the Ohio bar in May 2022.

His work combines local personal injury litigation with experience in mass torts and multidistrict litigation involving people injured by pharmaceutical products and medical devices.

 

A Toledo Native Representing Injured People in Northwest Ohio

Damon was born and raised in Toledo. He remained in Northwest Ohio for his undergraduate and graduate education at Bowling Green State University before attending the University of Toledo College of Law.

He graduated cum laude from the University of Toledo College of Law in 2021.

During law school, Damon served as Editor-in-Chief of Board 52 of the University of Toledo Law Review and as President of the Black Law Students Association.

He received the Dean’s Law Scholarship along with multiple Highest Ranking and Dean’s List awards.

Damon’s selection as editor-in-chief of the Toledo Law Review also marked a milestone for the law school.

He became the first Black student selected to lead the publication in its 52-year history.

The position placed him at the head of one of the College of Law’s principal scholarly publications while he continued developing his legal research, writing, and analytical skills.

Damon returned to the same community in which he grew up to build his legal career.

Today, his practice at Zoll & Kranz includes representing injured people in Toledo and communities throughout Northwest Ohio.

 

Car Accident and Personal Injury Litigation

Motor vehicle accidents are a central part of Damon’s personal injury practice.

He works on cases involving car accidents, commercial truck crashes, motorcycle accidents, and other collisions that cause physical injuries and financial losses.

Serious accident cases can involve disputed fault, multiple vehicles, commercial defendants, insurance coverage issues, significant medical treatment, permanent injuries, or disagreements over the relationship between a collision and a person’s medical condition.

Damon works with our legal team to develop personal injury cases around the facts of the crash, the available evidence, and the full extent of the client’s injuries and losses.

His practice also extends beyond roadway accidents.

Damon works on other serious personal injury matters involving people harmed through negligent or wrongful conduct.

Our Toledo personal injury practice represents people facing a wide range of injuries, from accident-related orthopedic injuries to traumatic brain injuries, permanent physical limitations, and fatal injuries.

Damon works alongside the other attorneys and staff at Zoll & Kranz throughout the development of these claims.

 

Plaintiff Litigation and Complex Injury Cases

Damon’s practice also includes mass tort and multidistrict litigation involving defective drugs and medical devices.

Those cases can involve large groups of injured plaintiffs, extensive medical records, scientific evidence, product history, regulatory information, and claims against major manufacturers.

Damon has worked within Zoll & Kranz’s complex litigation practice since his time as a law clerk and continued that work after becoming an attorney.

His experience across individual personal injury cases and larger consolidated proceedings gives Damon exposure to different forms of plaintiff litigation.

A Toledo car accident and a national medical-device case may involve very different facts and legal procedures, but both require careful attention to the evidence connecting a defendant’s conduct to an individual person’s injuries.

Damon’s work at Zoll & Kranz remains focused on representing injured people.

Our attorneys handle personal injury cases in Northwest Ohio while also representing plaintiffs in complex pharmaceutical, medical-device, and product-liability litigation across the country.

 

Legal Research, Writing, and Academic Background

Research and legal writing have been prominent parts of Damon’s professional development.

At the University of Toledo College of Law, his work on the Toledo Law Review required extensive legal research, writing, editing, and publication responsibilities.

His selection as editor-in-chief followed his work as a member of the journal and recognized both his academic performance and writing ability.

Before law school, Damon completed both undergraduate and graduate degrees at Bowling Green State University.

His coursework included projects completed with classmates in conjunction with the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation.

Damon carried that research-oriented background into his legal work at Zoll & Kranz, where personal injury and complex litigation frequently involve substantial records, detailed factual histories, and medical or technical evidence.

 

Professional Memberships

Damon is a member of the:

• Ohio State Bar Association
• Toledo Bar Association

He has maintained his professional connection to Toledo throughout his legal education and early career, from his leadership roles at the University of Toledo College of Law to his current plaintiff practice with Zoll & Kranz.

David W. Zoll is the founding partner of Zoll & Kranz and a longtime Toledo plaintiff trial lawyer whose career spanned personal injury, product liability, mass torts, antitrust litigation, and other complex civil cases.

Over nearly five decades in the legal profession, David represented people injured in car accidents, truck accidents, motorcycle accidents, by defective products and dangerous drugs, and through other forms of negligence.

His work took him from courtrooms throughout Ohio to trials and major consolidated proceedings across the United States.

He obtained multiple verdicts and settlements exceeding $1 million and served in leadership roles in significant pharmaceutical and medical-device litigation.

David founded the practice that became Zoll & Kranz around a plaintiff-focused approach to civil litigation.

The firm continues that work today from its Toledo office, representing people injured in motor vehicle accidents, catastrophic injury cases, wrongful death claims,, product-liability matters, and complex litigation throughout Northwest Ohio and across the country.

 

A Toledo Plaintiff Trial Lawyer

David graduated from the University of Cincinnati in 1974 and earned his law degree from the University of Toledo College of Law in 1976.

He was admitted to practice in Ohio in 1977 and built his legal career in Toledo.

His practice developed across a broad range of civil litigation, including personal injury, insurance disputes, professional negligence, product liability, construction cases, pharmaceutical litigation, and complex commercial matters.

His personal injury work included car accidents, truck accidents, motorcycle accidents, brain injuries, premises liability, wrongful death, construction accidents, and claims involving defective products.

Trial work remained a central part of David’s career.

He tried cases to verdict in Ohio and in courts in Chicago, West Palm Beach, Little Rock, Ann Arbor, Detroit, and Lexington.

His case work included both individual claims and larger proceedings involving extensive medical, scientific, technical, and corporate evidence.

David also became a Board Certified Civil Trial Advocate through the National Board of Trial Advocacy.

He later served on the NBTA Board of Examiners, where his responsibilities included preparing and grading examination questions concerning evidence, legal ethics, and complex business litigation for attorneys seeking civil trial certification.

 

Personal Injury and Motor Vehicle Litigation

Personal injury was an important part of David’s civil litigation practice throughout his career.

He represented plaintiffs in claims involving car accidents, truck crashes, motorcycle accidents, serious physical injuries, wrongful death, unsafe products, and other forms of negligent conduct.

His work included cases in which questions of fault, insurance coverage, medical causation, long-term injury, and financial damages required substantial investigation and contested litigation.

David’s appellate work also included an Ohio Supreme Court case that became part of the state’s modern comparative-negligence law.

He represented the appellee and cross-appellant in Anderson v. Ceccardi, 6 Ohio St.3d 110 (1983), where the Ohio Supreme Court considered how implied assumption of risk should operate under Ohio’s comparative-negligence framework.

The case became one of several matters David handled before the Ohio Supreme Court during his career.

His experience at both the trial and appellate levels shaped the litigation practice he later developed at Zoll & Kranz.

 

National Product Liability and Mass Tort Litigation

As David’s practice developed, he became increasingly involved in complex product-liability, pharmaceutical, medical-device, and mass-tort litigation.

One of his most significant roles came in the federal litigation involving contaminated heparin. The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio appointed David Plaintiffs’ Liaison Counsel in In re: Heparin Products Liability Litigation, MDL No. 1953.

He also founded and co-chaired the American Association for Justice Heparin Litigation Group.

David served as co-lead trial counsel in the first contaminated heparin trial against Baxter Healthcare and Scientific Protein Laboratories, which was tried in Cook County, Illinois in 2011.

Zoll & Kranz had filed some of the earliest lawsuits arising from the contaminated heparin litigation, and three firm clients later testified before Congress during an April 2008 hearing examining contaminated heparin and failures in the pharmaceutical supply chain.

His complex litigation work also included roles in the Sulzer Inter-Op Hip Prosthesis litigation, Vioxx Products Liability Litigation, Yamaha Rhino litigation, Text Messaging Antitrust Litigation, Polyurethane Foam Antitrust Litigation, Yaz and Yasmin litigation, and DePuy ASR Hip Implant litigation.

David and Zoll & Kranz represented hundreds of women in litigation involving Yaz and Yasmin and obtained tens of millions of dollars on behalf of those clients.

He also worked with Michelle L. Kranz during the DePuy ASR Hip Implant litigation, where Michelle served as Plaintiffs’ Liaison Counsel.

 

Building Zoll & Kranz

David’s influence on Zoll & Kranz extends beyond the individual cases he litigated.

His work as a Toledo trial lawyer created the foundation for a firm built around representing plaintiffs rather than defending corporations against injury claims.

The practice developed from local civil and personal injury litigation into national pharmaceutical, medical-device, product-liability, antitrust, and mass-tort cases while remaining rooted in Toledo and Northwest Ohio.

David also played an important role in Michelle Kranz’s development as a trial lawyer.

Michelle joined his practice after graduating from the University of Toledo College of Law and has described her admiration for David’s trial work and the opportunity to learn from him as significant reasons she remained in Toledo and ultimately formed a longstanding partnership with him.

The litigation practice David helped establish continues through Zoll & Kranz’s current attorneys.

The firm now represents people injured in car, truck, motorcycle, pedestrian, and bicycle accidents, along with clients in catastrophic injury, wrongful death, defective-product, pharmaceutical, and other serious personal injury matters.

 

Professional Leadership and Recognition

David’s work earned recognition from other trial lawyers and professional organizations throughout his career.

He was selected to the Ohio Super Lawyers list for multiple consecutive years, including a seventh consecutive selection in 2014.

He also received an AV peer-review rating from Martindale-Hubbell and was recognized among the Top 100 Trial Lawyers by the organization then known as the American Trial Lawyers Association.

His professional credentials included certification as a Civil Trial Advocate by the National Board of Trial Advocacy and service as an examiner for lawyers seeking board certification.

David shared his litigation experience through presentations to legal and professional organizations, including the American Association for Justice, Ohio State Bar Association, Ohio Academy of Trial Lawyers, Lucas County Bar Association, Toledo Bar Association, and other professional groups and continuing legal education programs.

 

Service to Toledo and Lucas County

David’s involvement in Toledo extended beyond private practice.

The Lucas County Commissioners appointed him to the Lucas County Mental Health and Recovery Services Board.

He previously served on the Lucas County Alcohol and Drug Addiction Services Board and participated in the committee responsible for combining that organization with the county’s mental health board.

He was also appointed to the Mental Health Board Review Committee.

His community service has included involvement with the Camp Storer-Toledo YMCA, Beach House Family Shelter, Christ Presbyterian Church, and the Toledo Council of Newspaper Unions-Toledo Blade Pension Plan.

David’s career has remained closely associated with Toledo: he attended the University of Toledo College of Law, built his practice in the city, represented plaintiffs throughout Northwest Ohio, served local organizations, and founded a law firm that continues to represent injured people from its Toledo office.

 

Current Status

After a legal career spanning nearly five decades, David has taken inactive status with the Ohio bar and no longer practices law. His work as a plaintiff trial lawyer and founding partner remains an important part of Zoll & Kranz’s history and the development of the firm’s personal injury and complex litigation practice.

 

Selected Court Admissions During His Practice

David’s admissions included the Supreme Court of Ohio, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, U.S. Tax Court, and United States Supreme Court.