Robert is a native to the Central California Valley. He lived in Turlock for the first fifteen years until the family moved to Santa Cruz where he graduated from Santa Cruz High School in 1962. In 1961 Robert enlisted in the Naval Reserve. He served three years in the fleet on board the U.S.S. Gudgeon SS567, a diesel electric submarine.
After being separated from the Navy, Robert worked for the Santa Cruz County Sheriff s Department for ten years. During this time he used his G.I. bill to attend Cabrillo College and U.C. Santa Cruz. Transferring to U.C. Davis he completed his undergraduate work, however, family demands made it necessary to forgo graduation formalities until 2004 when he applied for and was given a Bachelors of Science degree in Geology from U.C. Davis.
During the next fifteen years Robert worked in the Insurance Industry rising to management level within the first two years. He managed a Special Investigation Unit for one insurance company and then helped establish a Special Investigation Unit presence for another company. At the same time he attended Lincoln Law School in Sacramento.
Robert graduated from Lincoln Law School in 1994 and passed the bar that summer. He kept his commitment to help establish the Special Investigations Unit and did not begin to practice law until June of 1995 when he took a position with a Clovis law firm. In March of 1996, Robert opened his own practice with the help of his wife of 27 years, Marcella Downing. The practice has grown and when Marcella graduated from San Joaquin College of Law and passed the bar in 2005, the Law Office of Robert Howk grew to the Law Office of Howk & Downing, LLP.
Robert has taken an active part in community as a Rotarian and a VIP mentor among others. He is a member of the California State Bar and is admitted to practice in the Eastern District of the Federal Court, the Northern California Fraud Investigators, the United States Submarine Veterans Inc. and a member of the State Bar Solo and Small Practice section, and an avid attendee of the annual State Bar Ethics Symposiums. He has been a lecturer on ethics as part of San Joaquin College of Law s annual continuing education program for attorneys and a guest lecturer for Northern California Fraud Investigators.
As part of the continuing education demands he has placed on himself Robert attends between two to four weeks of continuing education each year in order to remain on the leading edge of the constant changes to the laws. As a member of Wealth Counsel and the National Association of Elder Law Attorneys (NAELA), the Law Office of Howk & Downing, LLP, works with thousands of attorneys nationwide to solve even the most complex questions on Estate Planning and Tax issues.