Texas’ Robert Roberson gets new execution date in ‘shaken baby’ case

A Texas judge scheduled Robert Roberson to be executed Oct. 16, granting the Texas attorney general’s request nearly a year after the death row inmate narrowly avoided lethal injection.

This is Roberson’s third execution date in the 22 years he’s spent on death row.

State District Judge Austin Reeve Jackson said there was no legal standing to put off setting the death date. Jackson reasoned that the condensed timeline may force the state’s highest criminal court to more quickly rule on Roberson’s latest plea for a new trial. That appeal was filed in February.

“I don’t know how setting a date gets the ball rolling,” Roberson’s lawyer, Gretchen Sween, said outside the Anderson County Courthouse in Palestine. “The idea that where a lengthy appeal is pending before the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, with lots of supporting materials to review that were nagging them to move forward?

“I don’t understand that,” Sween said.

Roberson, 58, was convicted of capital murder in 2003 for reportedly shaking his 2-year-old daughter, Nikki, to death. His conviction relied on prosecutors proving the toddler showed a triad of symptoms associated with “shaken baby syndrome,” a medical determination that has since been widely scrutinized by experts.

Roberson’s attorneys have long argued he is innocent of murder and that Nikki died of natural and accidental causes.

Roberson unexpectedly appeared in person at the hearing. As he was escorted in by sheriff’s deputies, murmurs and gasps filled the Anderson County courtroom. Roberson’s eyes appeared sullen, his hands and ankles were shackled and a bulletproof vest covered his striped jail uniform.

The plea pending before the appellate judges asks the high court to either declare Roberson’s innocence, grant him a new trial or send his case back to district court for “further fact-finding” based on new evidence his attorneys believe undermines the integrity of his conviction.

He was set to die Oct. 17, 2024, in Huntsville, but in a novel, 11th-hour move, state lawmakers issued a subpoena for Roberson to testify before a legislative committee, stalling the execution while the state’s highest appellate court weighed constitutional questions. Ultimately, the Texas Supreme Court ruled the subpoena was valid, but said legislators couldn’t use the maneuver to stall executions. Roberson never testified before the committee.

A few claps rang out from the gallery as the judge made his ruling after the 30-minute hearing. As Roberson was ushered out of the courtroom, his sister-in-law Jennifer Martin shouted, “We love you Robert.”

“Love you too,” he replied.

Outside the courthouse, Martin called the judge’s reasoning for setting a date “an excuse.”

“That judge had his mind made up before he walked in there today,” she said, “just like every other judge has.”

Matthew Bowman was 4 when his sister Nikki died. He disputes defense attorneys’ stance that Roberson did not kill Nikki.

“He’s had 24 years,” Bowman said. “Nothing so far proves why my sister had bruising on her brain, why her brain was swollen against her skull, why was her lip torn?

“None of that happens from pneumonia.”

Roberson has repeatedly been denied relief through the courts, including a challenge to his conviction through Texas’ “junk science” law. The 2013 law allows people to challenge their convictions based on scientific evidence that was not available during trial. Lawmakers have said they believe Roberson’s case embodies the very injustice the law was designed to correct.

Sween said she intends to request a stay of execution.