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Lawyers for Robert Roberson say the science used to sentence him to death is questionable and that prior health issues could explain the death of his 2-year-old daughter in 2002.
Roberson has maintained his innocence while being held on death row for more than 20 years. The Texas Court of Criminal Appealshis execution in 2016. But in 2023, the state’s highest criminal court decided that doubt over the cause of his daughter’s deathRoberson was convicted in 2002 of killing his sickly 2-year-old daughter, Nikki Curtis.
Roberson’s attorneys, in his latest habeas corpus petition denied on Wednesday, cited new evidence and three expert opinions that they said proved that Nikki died of natural and accidental causes — not of head trauma. “There was a tragic, untimely death of a sick child whose impaired, impoverished father did not know how to explain what has confounded the medical community for decades,” Roberson’s attorneys wrote.
In 2023, when the Court of Criminal Appeals denied Roberson a new trial, prosecutors argued that the evidence supporting Roberson’s conviction was still “clear and convincing” and that the science around shaken baby syndrome had not changed as much as his defense attorneys claimed.
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