About Carol Forte
Carol L. Forte joined the firm in 1984 after graduating from Seton Hall University School of Law. Her background as a registered nurse has proved useful in the medical malpractice cases she has handled, particularly in birth injury and cancer misdiagnosis matters. The National Law Journal recognized her as one of the top 10 litigators in New Jersey in a May 2000 article titled "Jersey Giants" and has cited her on multiple occasions as one of America's top 50 women litigators.
She was elected a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers in 2008, an honor extended by invitation only to trial lawyers who have demonstrated mastery of advocacy and maintained the highest standards of ethical conduct and professionalism. Membership in the College is limited to one percent of the total lawyer population in any state. She has been designated a Super Lawyer from 2005 through 2025 and was named to the Top 10 Super Lawyers list in New Jersey in 2025, ranked among the Top 5 for Personal Injury Plaintiff.
Proven verdicts and settlements
An Essex County jury awarded Sandra Szell $28.6 million after Kessler Institute aides mishandled a toilet-to-wheelchair transfer that fractured her spine and left her paralyzed from the chest down, though a confidential high-low agreement capped her actual recovery.
Walter Tirrell, a 28-year-old oiler on a gas-line crew, was standing in a closed lane on Route 31 near Ringoes on November 12, 1986 when a 45-foot flatbed tractor-trailer carrying a backhoe backed up two or three trailer lengths without a signalman or an audible alarm and rolled over his chest, killing him in front of his coworkers. His widow sued the trailer's manufacturer, Rogers Brothers Corporation, under the New Jersey Product Liability Act, arguing the trailer was defectively designed because it shipped without a back-up alarm that cost about $35. A jury awarded $2,500,000 for wrongful death and $50,000 for his conscious pain and suffering, and the Appellate Division affirmed in a published May 1991 opinion.
Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Each case is unique and depends on its own facts.
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