Gilbert Shelsby

Gilbert F. Shelsby, Jr. is of counsel at Kline & Specter, focusing on personal injury and medical malpractice cases throughout Delaware and surrounding regions. Before establishing his practice with partner Robert J. Leoni at Shelsby & Leoni, Shelsby practiced insurance defense law, representing doctors and hospitals in medical malpractice litigation—experience that provided critical insight into how insurance companies evaluate and defend personal injury claims. In 2013, Shelsby helped secure a $30 million settlement for a young child who sustained severe brain damage from improperly managed anesthesia during a routine hospital procedure. He litigated a workplace injury case involving severe arm and shoulder damage when another employee started a diesel tractor-trailer engine while Shelsby's client worked on the transmission; despite a $20,000 insurance offer, a jury awarded $3.2 million. In a birth injury matter, Shelsby represented a boy with permanent neurological nerve injuries to his arm caused by shoulder trauma during delivery after a physician failed to perform a necessary Cesarean section; the nearly two-week trial resulted in a $1.5 million verdict. He negotiated a settlement exceeding $4 million in a medical malpractice case where a woman lost her kidneys after an emergency room misdiagnosis of kidney stone and infection without prescribed antibiotics led to septic shock. Shelsby has been recognized as a top medical malpractice attorney by Delaware Today magazine and selected as a Super Lawyers honoree since 2007. He was named among the nation's top lawyers by Best Lawyers in America. A featured speaker on medical malpractice at the University of Maryland Law School, Widener Law School, and hospitals in Wilmington and Baltimore, Shelsby has taught seminars on Delaware nursing law. After law school, he served as law clerk for Joseph H.H. Kaplan, administrative judge of the Circuit Court for Baltimore City. He holds membership in the American Board of Trial Advocates, American Association for Justice, and Delaware Trial Lawyers Association.