Christopher Markarian

Christopher Markarian was born in Baghdad, Iraq, during the Iran-Iraq war, raised in Beirut, Lebanon, and studied philosophy and theology at a seminary from 14 to 17 before coming to the United States in 1998. He earned a GED in Chicago and enlisted in the U.S. Navy after Sept. 11, serving as a cryptologic interpreter during the Battle of Fallujah in 2004. He went to law school intending to become a JAG officer, until a personal injury attorney in East Los Angeles showed him he could serve without a uniform.

He tells prospective clients in serious cases to interview several other lawyers first, because he expects the relationship to outlast the case. “I knew this client before they had a case,” he says, and he intends to know them long after it ends. He is wary of private equity and offshore call centers eroding the attorney-client relationship. A U.S. Navy veteran who later served as an interrogator in the California National Guard, he speaks seven languages and is a deacon of the Armenian Church.

He represented three children whose father was killed by county sheriff’s deputies. Christopher carried the case through trial, and the jury awarded $10 million; the verdict was later affirmed on appeal. It reflects the civil rights side of a practice that also covers car accidents, wrongful death and claims against insurance companies and government entities for injured people and families along the pass between Redlands and Banning in California.

Markarian Law Group is in Yucaipa, California, with a website at markarianlg.com. Christopher made partner at the East Los Angeles personal injury firm where he started, bought out his partner and opened Markarian Law Group in 2013. He later moved the practice east and in 2021 bought a building in Yucaipa five miles from his home. He serves on the board of directors of the San Bernardino County Bar Association and belongs to the Consumer Attorneys Association of Los Angeles and the Armenian Bar Association.

Christopher Markarian earned a B.A. from Thomas Edison State College in 2009, then in 2012 completed both his J.D. at the University of La Verne College of Law and an M.A. in national security studies at California State University, San Bernardino. He was admitted to the State Bar of California in 2013. He is also a member of the California Lawyers Association, the Riverside County Bar Association, the Desert Bar Association and the Western San Bernardino County Bar Association.