Todd Kelly is, first,
and foremost, a child of God. He is a devoted husband to his wife, Robbye, and
father of four amazing children, Joshua, Meghan, Matthew, and Selby. He cooks
one large batch of crawfish per year and has become adept at smoking a brisket.
Because he has tried to do life without Him, Todd will testify that he is an
utter failure without his savior, Jesus, and that the rest of the narrative
below is possible only by His unending grace… read more about that miracle in
Todd’s recent autobiographical book Worth Dying For.
Professionally, Todd is Board Certified in Personal Injury Trial Law by
the Texas Board of Legal Specialization and is “AV” rated by
Martindale-Hubbell. Todd is licensed in Texas, Oklahoma, Virginia, New Mexico,
Colorado and Pennsylvania. He grew up in Arlington, Texas, and received his
Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Texas in 1987, while attending on an
ROTC Scholarship. He earned his juris doctorate from the Dickinson School of
Law in 1995 as a member of the Woolsack Honor Society, while serving as a U.S.
Marine, where he returned to practice as a criminal defense attorney in the
judge advocate’s corps.
Todd left the Marine Corps to enter private practice in 1998, after
attaining the rank of Major. He represented asbestos exposure victims and other
seriously injured people in Virginia and Pennsylvania before returning to
represent victims of birth injury and nursing home abuse in his native Texas in
2002.
In 2006, Todd opened
his own law firm in Houston, Texas, where he gained recognition for his
representation of sexual assault victims by overseas military contractors.
Todd has been
featured on 20/20, The Rachel Maddow Show, and has been interviewed on legal
topics by numerous national and local news programs, including CBS’ Insider
Edition. In 2009, Todd appeared in front of committees of the United States
Congress speaking on the Fairness in Arbitration Act, in an effort to eliminate
mandatory, binding, pre-dispute arbitration provisions that are found in
consumer products and other contracts. Todd was consulted by Senator Al
Franken, who sponsored an amendment to the Senate Appropriations bill during
that year which led to the abolition of forced arbitration for victims of
sexual assault by most military contractors.
In 2013, Todd was inducted into the Texas Lawyer Hall of Fame following a
$16,900,000 verdict on behalf of a mentally handicapped woman who was raped by
a caregiver at her daycare facility.
Todd has received his
10-year Super Lawyer award as a Texas Super Lawyer,
having been named by that publication in 2011, 2012 and every year since 2014.
Todd has dedicated his life to making America safer. He began that
service as a Marine Corps combat engineer officer. He now continues that work
by protecting those truly injured people who will never get the justice that
our system promises to them without holding greedy, powerful corporate entities
responsible for the damage they cause. As a member of the American Board of
Trial Advocates, as a member of the Executive Committee of the Texas Trial
Lawyers’ Association, and as a past president of the Capital Area Trial
Lawyers’ Association, he remains a staunch defender of our right to trial by a
jury of our peers in all cases with a value exceeding $20.00, as guaranteed by
the 7th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
Todd urges that if we
fail to protect the 7th Amendment to the United States Constitution, we will
eventually lose the rights guaranteed by all of the Amendments because it is
this right to hold the powerful accountable, protected by the 7th Amendment, that
protects the individual freedoms guaranteed by our Constitution.
