Nadia Lathan
Associated Press/US Press
AUSTIN, Texas — A bipartisan group of Texas lawmakers petitioned Republican Gov. Greg Abbott and the state’s Board of Pardons and Paroles on Tuesday to stop the execution scheduled for next month of a man convicted of killing his 2-year-old daughter in 2002, arguing the case is based on faulty scientific evidence.
The petition, filed by 84 of the 150 Republican-controlled state legislators, as well as medical experts, death penalty lawyers, a former detective who tried the case and best-selling author John Grisham, is a rare sign of broad bipartisan support in Texas against the planned executions.
Robert Roberson is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection on Oct. 17. Prosecutors say his daughter, Nikki Curtis, died from injuries caused by being violently shaken, also known as shaken baby syndrome.
“There is a bipartisan majority in the Texas House of Representatives who have serious doubts about the execution of Robert Roberson,” Democratic Rep. Joe Moody said at a news conference at the State Capitol. “This is one of those issues that is a matter of life and death, and our political ideology has no place here.”
Under Texas law, the governor may grant a one-time 30-day stay of execution, and a full pardon requires the recommendation of a majority of the Board of Pardons and Paroles, which is appointed by the governor.
Since taking office in 2015, Governor Abbott has granted pardons to only one death row inmate, commuting the death sentence of Thomas Whitaker to life in prison in 2018.
The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles declined to comment, and a spokesman for the governor’s office did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
The clemency petition and Roberson’s supporters argue that his conviction was based on inexact science and that experts have largely rejected the idea that Curtis’ symptoms were consistent with shaken baby syndrome.
“Nikki’s death is not a crime unless her parents’ failure to explain complex medical issues that even trained medical professionals could not understand at the time is,” the petition states. “We know that Nikki’s lungs became severely infected and she suffered from a lack of oxygen for several weeks before and after she collapsed.”
Roberson continues to maintain his innocence. In 2002, he took his daughter to the hospital after waking her up to find her unconscious and with blue lips. Doctors at the time were skeptical of Roberson’s claim that Curtis had fallen out of bed while sleeping, and testified at trial that her daughter’s symptoms were consistent with shaken baby syndrome.
Many medical experts now believe it’s too early to diagnose the syndrome before considering an infant’s medical history. Experts from Stanford University Medical Center, the University of Pennsylvania and Children’s Hospital of Minnesota are among those who signed the report.
Roberson is autistic and his lawyers argue his behavior was unfairly used against him and that doctors failed to rule out other medical explanations for Curtis’ symptoms, such as pneumonia.
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals had stayed the execution in 2016, but in 2023 the court again allowed the case to proceed and set a new execution date.
Prosecutors said the evidence against Roberson remains strong and that the science behind shaken baby syndrome has not changed as much as the defense argues.
Brian Wharton, a former chief of criminal investigations in Palestine, Texas, who helped prosecute Roberson, signed a petition publicly urging the state to halt the execution.
“Given everything I know now, I firmly believe Robert is innocent,” Wharton said.
