In 1999, he served as a
law clerk for Judge
John Thomas Greene Jr. of the
United States District Court for the District of Utah. He was an associate at Snow, Christensen & Martineau in
Salt Lake City from 2000 to 2005. From 2005 to 2011, he was an associate at Burbridge, Mitchell & Gross. From 2011 to 2012, he again practiced at Snow, Christensen & Martineau as a
shareholder. His practice focused on complex
commercial litigation and catastrophic
personal injury cases on behalf of both plaintiffs and defendants. Shelby served on the Salt Lake County Bar Association's Executive Committee since 2002, and as its vice chairman since 2011. He served on the Utah Supreme Court's Advisory Committee on Rules of Civil Procedure and its Ethics and Discipline Committee.
Federal judicial service On November 30, 2011, President
Barack Obama nominated Shelby to be district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Utah, In the early hours of September 22, 2012, on what was officially still the legislative day of September 21, the Senate confirmed Shelby in a
voice vote. He received his commission on September 25, 2012.
Notable decisions • On December 20, 2013, Shelby struck down
Amendment 3 of
Utah’s
State Constitution, which defined marriage as a union solely between a man and a woman, opening the way for
same-sex marriage in the state. He found that Amendment 3 was in violation of the
U.S. Constitution’s
14th Amendment, which guarantees due process and equal protection. This highly significant ruling set off a series of other district court decisions that overturned bans in several other states. His ruling was affirmed by the
Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals on June 25, 2014. On October 6, 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court declined the review the Tenth Circuit's ruling,
legalizing same-sex marriage in Utah. • On September 10, 2024, he would enjoin the
Utah Social Media Regulation Act for violating the first amendment. • On April 17, 2025, Shelby dismissed a lawsuit filed in October 2023 accusing
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints of fraud in its handling of tithing funds, primarily due to the plaintiffs missing the three-year statute of limitations after the
information regarding the church's financial holdings became public in late 2019 and early 2020. ==References==