Karen Koehler

Karen Koehler has practiced plaintiff personal injury law since 1985, when she passed the Washington bar at age 25 after graduating from Seattle University School of Law. She worked for an insurance defense firm and later for Tom Chambers, a mentor who later joined the State Supreme Court, before joining Stritmatter Law in 2004. Known among opposing counsel as "The Velvet Hammer," she served as President of the Washington State Association for Justice from 2007 to 2008 and founded the Spinal Cord Injury Association of Washington, serving as its Executive Director from 2010 to 2017. Her cases have included a $123 million verdict arising from the Seattle Ride the Ducks Aurora Bridge disaster and numerous multi-million-dollar verdicts in wrongful death, brain injury, and medical malpractice. She is a perennial Super Lawyers Top 50 Women Washington honoree and holds an AV Preeminent rating from Martindale-Hubbell.