Goldberg Segalla added partners Kimberly A. Cook and Valerie Shea to the firm’s General Liability and Global Insurance Services Practice Groups in Miami.
Kim is an accomplished trial lawyer with a focus on professional liability and medical malpractice, product liability, and complex commercial litigation. With over three decades of experience and a reputation for success in high-exposure specialty and catastrophic torts, Kim has taken more than 30 cases to verdict in Florida and around the country.
Kim’s experience in medical malpractice and health care-related litigation is extensive. She has served as trial counsel for physicians, medical specialists, assisted living facilities, home health agencies, and other clients in complex personal injury, malpractice, and commercial matters. She has also represented health care providers in claims brought by the Florida Department of Health Administration.
Kim is also a trusted trial attorney in the realm of product liability and related commercial litigation. She currently serves as regional counsel for one of the country’s largest manufacturers of heavy equipment and has defended multiple corporations against product defect claims, mass and catastrophic injury claims, general liability matters, and commercial litigation. Her trial experience includes product liability actions involving construction, mining, and earth-moving machinery, as well as a wide variety of residential and commercial products.
An active member and leader in numerous legal organizations, including the invitation-only American College of Trial Lawyers, Kim is also a Florida Supreme Court-certified mediator. She is a graduate of Tulane University and Loyola University College of Law.
Valerie focuses her practice on insurance coverage counsel and complex litigation, representing insurers in coverage and bad faith actions and advising them on wide variety of coverage policies. Her practice also includes employment and labor matters, professional liability, product liability, and complex and multi-party commercial litigation. As a trial attorney, Valerie has represented insurers as well as automotive dealers and product manufacturers in high-value tort actions, employers in discrimination actions, and professionals sued for both professional liability and commercial claims.
Valerie is active in her legal and local communities, and recognized for her leadership efforts in several legal and civic organizations. As president of the Florida Defense Lawyers Association she spearheaded diversity efforts that garnered the DRI Diversity Award in 2003. She earned recognition numerous times for her work with Election Protection, a non-partisan voting rights initiative. She is also a Certified Diversity Awareness Trainer, providing diversity training to law firms and other clients.
Rated AV Preeminent ® by Martindale-Hubbell’s peer-review system, Valerie has also been recognized and ranked by Best Lawyers in America, Florida Trend’s Legal Elite, Florida Super Lawyers, and South Florida Legal Guide. She is a graduate of Florida Atlantic University and Nova Southeastern University Shepard Broad Law Center.