Tenants destroyed the apartment, what remedy can a landlord get?

[Sara W.]

Hi for all the landlord out there, I recently just had a tenant moved out because their lease is up and we no longer wanted to lease the apartment to them. When I inspected the apartment it is in a very bad shape - carpets completely destroyed, several big holes on the wall, bathtub is all black, they unplugged the fridge and put food in there, so the whole fridge is molded. 

We have their deposit but they are not enough to pay for all the damages that they have done. Are there anything that we can do to recoup the damage they have done? 

Some suggests us to go to a small claim court. But should I notify the tenants first or should I file the paper work directly? Or should we just let it go and consider this a cost of business?

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. We estimated the cost to fix all the damages is at least $4k to 5k with labor and materials. 

Thank you!