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A Texas man on death row is now scheduled to be put to death in October for his conviction in the death of his 2-year-old daughter in 2002, after his execution was delayed last year amid concerns about whether he is guilty.
Robert Roberson’s new execution date was set for Oct. 16 at 6 p.m., according to Judge Austin Reeve Jackson, who said it’s the “reality of where we are.” The new execution date is a year after his initial execution date was paused after a push from a bipartisan group of state lawmakers, among others.
Attorneys for Roberson, 58, criticized the judge’s ruling, arguing that substantial evidence shows he did not kill his daughter, Nikki Curtis, more than two decades ago in a case of the shaken baby hypothesis they say has been widely discredited.
“Texans should be outraged that the court has scheduled an execution date for a demonstrably innocent man,” his attorney, Gretchen Sween, said in a statement to Fox News Digital.
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Robert Roberson’s new execution date was set for Oct. 16 at 6 p.m. (Criminal Justice Reform Caucus via AP)
“Everyone who has taken the time to look at the evidence of Robert Roberson’s innocence—including the lead detective, one of the jurors, a range of highly qualified experts, and a bipartisan group of Texas lawmakers—has reached the same conclusion: Nikki’s death was a terrible tragedy. Robert did not kill her. There was no crime,” she continued.
More than 80 state lawmakers, as well as the detective who helped the prosecution, medical experts, parental rights groups, human rights groups, bestselling novelist John Grisham and other advocates have called for the state to grant Roberson clemency over the belief that he is innocent. A group of state lawmakers also visited Roberson in prison last year to encourage him.
Sween said she would seek a stay of Roberson’s execution “so all of the evidence that proves he is innocent can be reviewed by the courts without the pressure of a looming execution date.”
If he is put to death, Roberson would be the first person in the U.S. to be executed in a case based on shaken baby syndrome.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton recently asked the court to schedule Roberson’s execution despite the state Court of Criminal Appeals still considering new evidence about his potential innocence, Sween noted.
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Texas lawmakers meet with Robert Roberson at a prison in Livingston, Texas, on Friday, Sept. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Criminal Justice Reform Caucus)
Roberson was convicted after prosecutors argued he killed his daughter by shaking her to death. But his lawyers have said Nikki actually died from other health issues such as pneumonia and that new evidence proves his innocence. His lawyers also said doctors had failed to rule out these other medical explanations for the child’s symptoms.
“I believe he is innocent for two distinct reasons,” Sween told Fox News Digital last year. “The theory that there was a crime that was used to convict him, which was then known as the shaken baby syndrome hypothesis, has been thoroughly discredited. There is no one now who would say the version of that hypothesis that was put before his jury as if it were scientific fact is legitimate.”
“Also, I know from the experts that had dug into his daughter’s medical records and examined the evidence that this exceedingly ill child died from undiagnosed pneumonia that was [ravaging] her lungs, combined with very dangerous prescription medications she was given in the last few days of her life,” she continued. “And it’s not to suggest that doctors did this intentionally. It’s just they didn’t know about the pneumonia.”
Roberson was scheduled to be put to death on Oct. 17, 2024, before the state Supreme Court issued a stay to delay his execution shortly before it was set to take place.
Robert Roberson and his daughter, Nikki. (Roberson Family)
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The state House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence issued a subpoena the day before Roberson’s scheduled execution for him to testify at a hearing about his case. The state Supreme Court paused the execution that night to review the committee’s request.
The court said in November that the committee should be allowed to hear his testimony, as long as a subpoena does not block an inevitable execution.
Roberson did not appear at subsequent House committee meetings after Paxton’s office pushed to prevent him from testifying at the state Capitol.