On October 9, one week before he was scheduled to be killed, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals stayed Robert Roberson’s execution and reinstated the temporary restraining order requested by Texas lawmakers, the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty reported. The high court sent his case back to the district court to reconsider his sentence in light of the fact that another person convicted based on the debunked theory of Shaken Baby Syndrome, the same crime prosecutors convicted Robert of, was exonerated last November by the CCA.
Roberson, who has Autism Spectrum Disorder, was granted custody of his two-year-old daughter, Nikki, who was chronically ill, in November 2001. In 2002, Nikki was sick with a high fever and undiagnosed pneumonia when she suffered a short fall from bed. Roberson took Nikki to the emergency room, where hospital staff did not know he had Autism and judged his response to his daughter’s serious condition as lacking emotion. The police and prosecutors similarly rushed to judgment, and, after Nikki tragically died, Roberson was prosecuted, convicted, and sentenced to death based on the SBS hypothesis.
If Roberson’s execution had proceeded, he would have been the first person in the U.S. to be put to death based on SBS, a diagnosis that even the physician who first identified it told NPR may be relied upon too often by doctors and medical examiners as the cause of a baby’s death or injury without considering other factors.
Roberson has wide-ranging support from scientists, doctors, faith leaders, innocence groups, attorneys who have represented clients wrongfully accused of murder by SBS, former federal judges, and one of his trial jurors. The lead detective on Roberson’s case, who testified for the prosecution at his 2003 trial, now believes Roberson is innocent. Last July, the New York Times posted a powerful and beautifully written video documenting a meeting between the two men on death row. “There is unassailable doubt that Robert did it,” the detective says. As for Roberson, he says, “I just hope and pray that we can make things right together.”