Matthew D. Easton

Career Highlights

• Co-Managing Partner of a Multigenerational Family Firm: Serves as co-managing partner of Easton & Easton, LLP, the plaintiff-side personal-injury practice founded by his father, W. Douglas Easton, in 1991. Easton became a full partner in 2014 and has helped direct the business side of the firm’s growth since 2019.
• Exclusive Plaintiff-Side Practice: Easton & Easton represents injured people and families—not insurance companies or defendants—in personal-injury, catastrophic-injury, product-liability, and wrongful-death matters.
• More Than $200 Million Recovered for His Clients: The firm reports that Easton has helped obtain more than $200 million through verdicts, settlements, and arbitration awards. Easton & Easton reports more than $500 million recovered firmwide.
• Experience Against Powerful Defendants: Has litigated hundreds of cases involving major corporations, the State of California, municipalities, school districts, property owners, and commercial defendants.
• Official Sports Partnerships: Easton & Easton is the Official Personal Injury Attorney Partner of Angels Baseball and the Official Personal Injury Law Firm of the Anaheim Ducks. These are firm partnerships rather than personal awards issued to Easton.
• Trial-Technology Educator: His use of technology in case preparation and courtroom presentations led to his appointment as an adjunct professor at Whittier Law School.
• Sustained Professional Recognition: Progressed from nine consecutive Rising Stars selections to four consecutive Southern California Super Lawyers selections through 2026, while also earning lifetime membership in the Multi-Million Dollar Advocates Forum.
• Exceptional Client Feedback: Easton & Easton’s Costa Mesa office maintains an impressive 4.9-star Google rating based on more than 229 reviews.
• Direct Spanish-Language Communication: Easton became fluent in Spanish while living in Mexico City for two years, allowing him to communicate personally with English- and Spanish-speaking clients.

Proven Experience

• $32 Million Bicyclist Settlement: Helped secure the complete available policy limits for a 71-year-old bicyclist who lost both feet after a cement truck struck and dragged him more than 100 feet. Although the original police report blamed the bicyclist, the legal team located and enhanced surveillance footage showing that he had been riding in the designated bicycle area. The evidence reversed the liability dispute and established the truck driver’s responsibility. The result was ranked as California’s largest bicycle-accident settlement of 2024 and among the country’s 20 largest personal-injury settlements that year.
• $26 Million Construction-Site Settlement: Helped represent a day laborer severely injured while servicing a construction elevator. The general contractor argued that the worker could recover only through workers’ compensation, which had paid less than $1 million. Following more than two years of litigation, the legal team defeated that position and obtained the complete policy limits several weeks before trial. The recovery was ranked as Los Angeles County’s largest personal-injury settlement of 2023.
• $22.25 Million Bicyclist Settlement: Helped represent a bicyclist who suffered a traumatic brain injury and multiple orthopedic injuries when a driver experiencing a diabetic seizure struck him from behind. The driver’s employer denied responsibility, leaving only $15,000 in apparent insurance coverage. The firm uncovered evidence that the employer knew about the employee’s condition and previous seizures while maintaining working conditions that interfered with blood-sugar monitoring. The employer settled shortly before trial.
• $20 Million Premises-Liability Settlement and Safety Changes: Helped overcome defendants who denied all responsibility after a client was seriously injured on their property. Following more than three years of litigation, multiple unsuccessful dismissal attempts, and more than 20 depositions, the legal team established that the premises had been negligently designed. The settlement also required substantial property modifications intended to prevent another similar injury.
• $7 Million Recovery in a Case Other Firms Declined: Helped represent a college student who suffered facial fractures and a traumatic brain injury after falling more than two stories inside a newly constructed auditorium. Despite serious comparative-fault concerns, nearly five years of litigation uncovered building-code violations involving an unlocked roof ladder, an unsecured roof hatch, and an improperly installed card reader. The defendants collectively settled two weeks before trial.
• $3.06 Million Motorcycle-Accident Settlement: Personally litigated a disputed case involving a lane-splitting motorcyclist struck when a shuttle bus crossed double-yellow lines into the carpool lane. Easton established that the bus driver’s illegal lane change—not the motorcyclist’s lane splitting—caused the collision. The client received compensation without having to undergo a deposition or trial.