Jacquelyn Smith Clarke
Biography
Jacquelyn Clarke is a Partner in our Atlanta office and also serves as Lead Hiring Partner, overseeing the hiring of associate attorneys across all HBS offices while focusing on the Southeast. Jacque specializes in the defense of both health care providers and professional malpractice matters and focuses her practice on complex medical malpractice cases. Her experience includes a wide variety of areas including heart and spine surgeries, anesthesia claims, and birth trauma cases.
Since the beginning of her practice, she has defended complex professional liability cases, including those against doctors, nurses, EMTs, lawyers, engineers, and accountants. She has significant experience in wrongful death, catastrophic injury, and product liability cases.
She also works with aging services providers on issues they face including regulatory compliance, administrative hearings, and appeals. She has specialized experience in COVID-19 related claims and regulatory matters. Other areas of experience include premises liability (including at hospitals and with health care providers, suicide cases, and shooting cases), construction wrongful death cases, transportation claims involving multiple death accidents, and general liability matters.
Jacque enjoys being in the courtroom and has tried multiple cases to verdict in state and federal courts, including multiple cases to verdict as first chair trial counsel. She has been admitted pro hac vice over a dozen times across the United States in multiple jurisdictions as part of HBS’s National Trial Counsel team. She routinely defends providers, businesses, and insurers in matters with demands in excess of ten million dollars. She has unique experience on our National Trial Counsel team working with local counsel to prepare cases for trial with very short notice. She has worked with experts around the world and defended cases involving significant media attention.
Jacque earned a Juris Doctor from Mercer University’s Walter F. George School of Law, where she attended on full scholarship and from which she graduated in the top 10% of her class, receiving the Dean’s Award for Distinguished Service to the Law School. She was a member of the Mercer Law Review and an active leader and participant in oral advocacy teams at the trial and appellate level including national awards. She also edited the Journal of Southern Legal History—for which she now serves as the Editor in Chief and as the Board Secretary and Trustee for the Georgia Legal History Foundation, a prestigious group of legal scholars and judges in Georgia.
She is also an active participant in both the firm’s Women’s Forum and Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion Committees. She volunteers in the community in several leadership roles, including multiple terms on the Alumni Council for Berry College, from which she graduated magna cum laude, served as Senior Class President, and received multiple athletic, academic, and service scholarships and awards, including an All American award in Cross Country and Track for her academic and athletic performance. In 2021 she was included on the Best Lawyers: Ones to Watch inaugural list.
Experience
Significant first and second chair experience at trial, including direct and cross examinations of both fact and expert witnesses.
Defense of corporations, hospitals, professionals, and individuals routinely in matters with eight-figure demands.
Management of voluminous electronic discovery.
Admitted pro hac vice and appearance as trial counsel in Alabama, Arkansas, California, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Oklahoma, and throughout Georgia.
Jacque works with aging services providers on issues they face including regulatory compliance, administrative hearings, and appeals.
Jacque brings experience in a wide variety of general liability claims, specifically premise liability. She has trial experience in both state and federal courts, handling cases of all levels of exposure, and involving a wide array of allegations and issues including defending premises liability claims, negligent security claims, motor vehicle accidents, and personal injury claims.
She represents property owners, businesses, and facilities in claims involving anything from minor injuries to wrongful death and supports clients through all stages of litigation, from notice of a claim through final resolution.
Jacque defends medical professionals and medical facilities, including doctors, nurses, and hospitals, against claims ranging from negligent treatment and diagnosis to birth trauma and wrongful death. She handles cases from inception through investigation and all aspects of litigation. Jacque also represents medical professionals in matters before the respective licensing boards and has handled peer review proceedings before hospital panels of physicians.
Jacque has experience representing manufacturers in the defense of products liability claims resulting from injuries or death, alleged to be caused by product defects. She is prepared to assist manufacturers and suppliers in the investigation and defense of products liability actions. She has managed large scale electronic discovery requests directed at international product manufacturers and defended proprietary interests related to products at issue in litigation.
Jacque represents professionals, including attorneys, engineers, physicians, and accountants against claims of malpractice, breach of fiduciary duty, or ethical violations. Jacque has represented professionals in litigation pending in local courts as well as federal court.
Credentials
Admitted
State Courts:
- Georgia
Education
- J.D., magna cum laude, Mercer University, Walter F. George School of Law
- B.S., magna cum laude, Berry College
Memberships
- American Bar Association
- American Health Law Association
- Atlanta Bar Association
- Berry College Alumni Counsel
- Georgia Defense Lawyer’s Association Women Litigators Section, Chair of Publications
- Juris Inc.;Co-Chair, Executive Board Member
- Journal of Southern Legal History, Co-Editor in Chief
- Defense Research Institute (DRI)
- Georgia Defense Lawyers Association
- Georgia Legal History Foundation Secretary
- Georgia Society of Healthcare Risk Managers (GSHRM)
- Phi Kappa Phi & Brainerd Currie Honor Societies, 2013-2023
Recognition
- Best Lawyers: Ones to Watch® in America, Best Lawyers®, 2021-2024
- Environmental Law
- Insurance Law
- Professional Malpractice Law
- 2023 Georgia Rising Stars, Super Lawyers
Presentations
- The Anatomy of a COVID-19 Enforcement Appeal – The American Health Law Association Long Term Care and the Law 2022 Program
AHLA 2022, February 2022 - 360 View: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Claims Management– Panel Discussion
CLM Greater Atlanta Chapter and the National African-American Insurance Association, June 2021 - Payments, Politics and Publicity – Updates and Trends in Medical Malpractice and Aging Services
Georgia Defense Lawyers Association’s Annual Meeting, June 2021
Publications
- Medical Malpractice Cases
The Litigation Psychology Podcast; January 30, 2023 - Maintaining Your COVID-19 Library of Materials
McKinght’s Long-Term Care News, February 2022 - How Personnel Files Can Affect Medical Malpractice Claims
Law 360, December 2021 - Vaccinate All Educators by April 2021? Acceleration of COVID-19 Vaccination Rollout in Georgia Through the Federal Retail Pharmacy Program
HBS Health Care Highlights Blog, March 2021
- How ‘Open And Obvious’ Begets ‘Plain And Palpable’: Appeals Court Rules For State University In Premises Suit
HBS Governmental Liability Blog, October 2020 - Defense Strategies for Dealing with Life Care Planners
Medical Liability Monitor, August 2019 - A Comprehensive Guide for Defending Opioid Claims
Hall Booth Smith, March 2018 - The Proposed Fairness in Disclosure of Evidence Act of 2012: More Cons than Pros with Proposed Disclosure Requirements in Federal Criminal Cases
Mercer Law Review, 2013 - Evidence
Mercer Law Review, 2016 - Evidence
Mercer Law Review, 2015
- Evidence
Mercer Law Review, 2014