DEFUNIAK SPRINGS, FLA. — A Florida surgeon was indicted on a charge of second-degree manslaughter after he removed a patient's liver instead of his spleen during a scheduled laparoscopic splenectomy on Aug. 21, 2024, at Ascension Sacred Heart Emerald Coast in Miramar Beach, Florida. The patient, a 70-year-old man from Muscle Shoals, Alabama, identified as William Bryan, died on the operating table from blood loss.
Dr. Thomas Shaknovsky, 44, of DeFuniak Springs, Florida, was taken into custody in Miramar Beach on Monday morning and transported to the Walton County Jail ahead of his first court appearance on Tuesday. Available court records did not name an attorney for Shaknovsky.
"Our duty is to follow the facts wherever they lead, without fear or favor," Walton County Sheriff Michael Adkinson said. "The grand jury has spoken, and our responsibility is to ensure the charges are carried out through the proper legal process. Our thoughts remain with the victim's family and their unspeakable loss."
Bryan, a U.S. Navy veteran who had been married for 33 years, was visiting a rental property in Okaloosa County, Florida, with his wife, Beverly, in August 2024 when he began experiencing left-sided flank pain. He was admitted for further tests due to concern about an abnormality of the spleen. Imaging showed a suspected enlarged spleen and blood in the peritoneum with no active hemorrhage, and Shaknovsky recommended surgery. According to court filings, for two days before the operation, Shaknovsky advised Bryan to undergo surgery, and on the third day he continued to pressure him to consent. Bryan was initially reluctant to proceed until doctors said he could face serious complications if he left the hospital.
According to court filings, Shaknovsky continued the operation after the patient went into cardiac arrest. A license suspension order states that Shaknovsky told investigators he could not control an aneurysm that filled the patient's chest cavity with blood and that he decided to complete the splenectomy after the patient had been in cardiac arrest for 15 minutes. Court filings state that Shaknovsky believed the organ he removed was the spleen and that shock and chaos prevented him from properly identifying it. After the surgery, he said the patient died of a ruptured splenic artery aneurysm.
An autopsy found no evidence of a ruptured splenic artery aneurysm. The autopsy determined that Bryan's spleen and its attachments were untouched and in the normal position, and his liver was missing.
Florida suspended Shaknovsky's medical license in 2024 under an order signed by Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo. The Alabama Board of Medical Examiners filed a court order to temporarily suspend his license after the surgery. Shaknovsky voluntarily surrendered his Alabama medical license after regulators moved to revoke it, and the Alabama Medical Licensure Commission revoked it in 2024. His New York medical license was suspended in 2025.
Court filings also reference two earlier incidents. In May 2023, Shaknovsky is accused of removing part of a patient's pancreas during a routine surgery instead of the left adrenal gland; he settled a malpractice claim related to that case for $400,000 in 2024, according to public records. In July 2023, court filings accuse him of removing part of a patient's intestine during a procedure, causing a gastrointestinal perforation that led to that patient's death in the ICU.