HOUSTON (AP) — The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles has denied a request for clemency for a man who this week could be the first person in the U.S. executed for a murder conviction tied to the diagnosis of shaken baby syndrome.
The parole board voted Wednesday against recommending that Robert Roberson’s death sentence be commuted to life in prison or that his execution be delayed.
Roberson is scheduled to receive a lethal injection Thursday evening for the 2002 killing of his 2-year-old daughter, Nikki Curtis. Roberson has long proclaimed his innocence.
Gov. Greg Abbott can only grant clemency after receiving a recommendation from the board. Abbott does have the power to grant a one-time 30-day reprieve without a board recommendation.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
HOUSTON (AP) — A Texas man who this week could be the first person in the U.S. executed for a murder conviction tied to the diagnosis of shaken baby syndrome awaited a decision Wednesday on his request for clemency from a state board.
The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles' decision on whether to recommend that Robert Roberson's execution on Thursday be stopped either through a commutation of his sentence or a reprieve was expected to come on the same day that a Texas House committee met in Austin to discuss his case.
Roberson, 57, is scheduled to receive a lethal injection for the 2002 killing of his 2-year-old daughter, Nikki Curtis, in the East Texas city of Palestine. Roberson has long proclaimed his innocence.
Brian Wharton, the lead detective with Palestine police who investigated Curtis’ death, told members of the Texas House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee on Wednesday that he feels shame for playing a role in Roberson’s conviction as he had doubts about the case during his trial. He called on the parole board and Gov. Greg Abbott to halt his execution.
“Don’t make my mistake. Listen to Robert. Hear his voice wherever you can find him, on the pages of all those documents you have from his attorney. But listen and you will hear innocence,” Wharton told members of the committee, most of whom are part of a bipartisan group of more than 80 state lawmakers who have asked the parole board and Abbott to stop the execution.
Abbott can only grant clemency after receiving a recommendation from the parole board. Under Texas law, Abbott has the power to grant a one-time 30-day reprieve without a recommendation from the board.
In his nearly 10 years as governor, Abbott has halted only one imminent execution, in 2018 when he spared the life of Thomas Whitaker.
The parole board has recommended clemency in a death row case only six times since the state resumed executions in 1982.
One of those who has been pushing to stop Roberson’s execution is Texas GOP megadonor and conservative activist Doug Deason.
“I believe he is innocent,” Deason wrote in a post on X on Tuesday.
Deason told the Houston Chronicle he has been talking directly with Abbott's general counsel, James Sullivan, and two other Abbott staff members in recent weeks about Roberson's case.
Roberson’s lawyers, the Texas lawmakers, medical experts and others say his conviction was based on faulty and now outdated scientific evidence related to shaken baby syndrome. The diagnosis refers to a serious brain injury caused when a child’s head is hurt through shaking or some other violent impact, like being slammed against a wall or thrown on the floor.
Roberson’s supporters don’t deny that head and other injuries from child abuse are real. But they say doctors misdiagnosed Curtis’ injuries as being related to shaken baby syndrome and that new evidence has shown the girl died not from abuse but from complications related to severe pneumonia.
Roberson’s attorneys say he was wrongly arrested and later convicted after taking his daughter to a hospital. They say she had fallen out of bed in Roberson's home after being seriously ill for a week. His lawyers say the short fall from the bed would have explained the only injury, a minor one, that a defense expert later found on the girl's head.
Roberson’s lawyers have also suggested that his autism, which was undiagnosed at the time of his daughter’s death, was used against him as authorities became suspicious of him because of his lack of emotion over what had happened to his daughter. Autism impacts how people communicate and interact with others.
The American Academy of Pediatrics, other medical organizations and prosecutors say the diagnosis is valid and that doctors look at all possible things, including any illnesses, when determining if injuries are attributable to shaken baby syndrome.
The Anderson County District Attorney’s Office, which prosecuted Roberson, has said in court documents that after a 2022 hearing to consider the new evidence in the case, a judge rejected the theories that pneumonia and other diseases caused Curtis’ death.
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has repeatedly denied Roberson’s request to stay his execution, most recently on Wednesday. Roberson's attorneys have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay his execution.
On Tuesday, an East Texas judge denied requests by Roberson’s attorneys to stop his lethal injection by vacating the execution warrant and recusing the judge who had issued the warrant.
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