Mark Forest Underwood

Mark Underwood is a McKinney, TX lawyer who focuses on injury and disability cases, including car accidents, brain injuries, motorcycle accidents, truck accidents, slip and fall accidents, social security, ERISA, premises liability, burns, negligent security and medical malpractice.. He makes the world safer by representing victims needlessly injured by others.

Past cases have ranged from the catastrophic Upper Big Branch coal mine explosion to customers set fire at gas stations by static electricity, and a $40.00 ERISA case that made international news. He has been featured on talk shows, including Fox & Friends. A medical malpractice case was discussed on Oprah.

He represented 185 victims of the West, TX fertilizer plant explosion that killed 15 and injured 300. He also represented six of 14 class representatives in the class action arising from the the Freedom Industries MCHM chemical spill that poisoned the water for 300,000 people in Charleston, WV

He is licensed to practice before the state and federal courts of West Virginia, Texas, California, and Washington, D.C. He was elected a member of the West Virginia State Legislature in 1996 at age 32. He has been recognized by Virginia Super Lawyers, a Thomson Reuters Publication, (2007), Marquis Who’s Who in American Law (2005-present), Marquis Who’s Who in America (2005-present), and Marquis Who’s Who in the World (2005-present). He is a graduate of the National Institute of Trial Advocacy (1992), the Gerry Spence Trial Lawyers College (2001), and the American Association of Justice’s Ultimate Advocacy College (2002, 2013).

He received his law degree from Pepperdine University in Malibu, California in 1989. He graduated from Marshall University with a Bachelors of Business Administration (Finance) in 1986. While attending law school, Mark was elected to the School of Law Honor Board which adjudicated violations of the school’s honor code. He studied international law in London, England.

While in college, Mark was the captain of his college track team and a conference champion in the pole vault. Mark formerly practiced law in Los Angeles, California, for Crosby, Heafey, Roach & May which has since become the California offices of one of the world’s largest firms, Reed Smith. He completed his first marathon at 48 years of age in Dallas, TX.

He has been skydiving, heli-skiing, white water rafting, and obtained his private pilot’s license. He is married to Cynthia Walker Underwood of McKinney, Texas. They have a son, Chace Forest Underwood. They reside in McKinney, TX.