The Texas Supreme Court clears the way for a new execution date for Robert Roberson in ‘shaken baby’ death

CNN
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The Texas Supreme Court said Friday that the execution of a man convicted of murder in the 2002 death of his two-year-old daughter can move forward, even as a state House committee tries to subpoena the man for his testimony and bipartisan battles continue. members thereof. to spare his life.

Robert Roberson, 57, was scheduled to be executed in October, but a state House committee used its investigative powers and issued a subpoena for Roberson’s testimony, leading the Supreme Court to temporarily halt the execution so it could consider the request.

Friday’s decision clears the way for a new execution date to be set by a state court judge.

Roberson’s conviction was based on allegations that his daughter, Nikki Curtis, died of shaken baby syndrome, a diagnosis his attorneys say is incorrect.

“Categorically prioritizing a legislative subpoena over a scheduled execution … would become a powerful legal tool that could be deployed not only to obtain necessary testimony but also to prevent an execution,” the Texas Supreme Court decision said .

Roberson’s attorney, Gretchen Sween, asked the state in a statement to refrain from setting a new execution date given “the overwhelming new evidence of innocence.”

“The additional benefit to Mr. Roberson of delaying his execution hopefully gives those in power time to address a grave error and see what is clear to anyone who honestly considers the medical evidence: death of his daughter Nikki was a tragedy, not a crime ; Robert is innocent,” Sween said, noting that even the lead detective on the case is convinced her client “was hastily and wrongly convicted as guilty.”

Roberson says he is innocent. His lawyers insist the diagnosis that his daughter died of shaken baby syndrome is incorrect.

While child abuse pediatricians continue to insist on the validity of the shaken baby syndrome diagnosis, Roberson’s attorneys say there is ample evidence that his daughter did not die from child abuse.

The stay of Roberson’s execution was triggered last month when lawmakers on the Texas Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence voted to subpoena Roberson as they considered the legality of his conviction.

Friday’s decision said Roberson’s testimony before the House committee could take place before the new execution date. A new date has not been set.

CNN has contacted the Anderson County district attorney’s office, which would ask a state court to set a new execution date.

Texas law requires a judge to set an execution date at least 90 days in advance, meaning Roberson’s earliest execution could be early next year.

“If the committee still desires to obtain his testimony, we believe the department could reasonably grant a new subpoena,” the Supreme Court decision said.

“To the extent that no relief is provided, so long as a subpoena is issued in a manner that does not inevitably block a scheduled execution, nothing in our possession precludes the committee from pursuing legal action in the ordinary course to compel the testimony of a witness. ”

The state Supreme Court’s stay last month halted Roberson’s execution just over an hour before his death sentence was set to expire at midnight on Oct. 17. It followed a remarkable series of legal maneuvers as the state and Roberson’s lawyers fought over his fate.

In a statement Friday, state Reps. Joe Moody and Jeff Leach said delaying the execution was not their intention, and the court’s ruling “strongly reinforced our belief that our committee can indeed obtain Mr. Roberson’s testimony and made clear that they of the executive branch expects the government to accommodate us.”

Roberson would have become the first person in the US to be executed for a conviction based on a charge of shaken baby syndrome.

While child abuse pediatricians fiercely defend the legitimacy of the diagnosis, Roberson’s advocates say the courts have yet to consider sufficient evidence that his daughter did not die of a murder, but of a variety of causes, including a disease and medications now deemed inappropriate are considered for such a morbid life. child.

Roberson’s attorneys have argued that his due process rights were violated when the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals refused to consider additional evidence that the inmate said would support his claim of innocence.

Roberson’s claim of innocence underlines the inherent risk of the death penalty: a potentially innocent person could be prosecuted dead. Since 1973, at least 200 people — including 18 in Texas — have been exonerated after being sentenced to death, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

At the time of her death, Nikki had double pneumonia that had progressed to sepsis, his lawyers say, and she had been prescribed two medications now considered unsuitable for children and which would have further impaired her ability to breathe.

Moreover, she had fallen out of bed the night before Roberson took her to the emergency room in Palestine, Texas — and was particularly vulnerable given her illness, Roberson’s attorneys say, pointing to all of these factors as explanations for her condition.

Roberson’s supporters include Brian Wharton, the former detective who oversaw the investigation into Nikki’s death, as well as more than thirty scientists and medical experts who agree with the doctors cited by the inmate’s lawyers, a bipartisan group of more than eighty Texas lawmakers who are autism advocates. groups and author John Grisham. All have cried out for mercy.

In October, the appeals court ordered a new trial for a man sentenced to 35 years in prison for his conviction for injury to a child, in a case that also relied on the shaken baby syndrome argument.

Roberson’s supporters believe he should also benefit from this law, which was “precisely intended for cases like this,” the committee said in a letter to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.

His lawyers do not dispute that babies can die from being shaken. But they argue that milder explanations, including illness, can mimic the symptoms of tremors, and those alternative explanations must be ruled out before a medical expert testifies with certainty that the cause of death was abuse.

Shaken Baby Syndrome is accepted as a valid diagnosis by the American Academy of Pediatrics and is supported by child abuse pediatricians who spoke to CNN.

The condition, first described in the mid-1970s, has been considered for the past 15 years to be a form of ‘abuse head trauma’ – a broader term used to describe actions other than shaking, such as a blow to the head of a child.

Criminal defense attorneys have also oversimplified the way doctors diagnose abuse from head trauma, pediatricians say, noting that there are many factors that determine this.

Still, the diagnosis has been the focus of debates in courtrooms across the country. Courts in at least 17 states and the U.S. military have exonerated 32 people convicted in shaken baby syndrome cases since 1992, according to the National Registry of Exonerations.

Sween described Roberson on Friday as “an autistic father who was unable to explain his daughter’s complex medical condition that took highly trained medical specialists years to figure out.”

“No Texan wants to see an innocent man executed,” she said.

This is a developing story and will be updated.