Death Row man saved from execution at eleventh hour set to ‘give his aspect of story’
Robert Roberson, the man on Death Row whose execution was halted hours before he was to be killed, is expected to testify before a panel later today (October 28).
Roberson is accused of the murder of his two-year-old daughter, Nikki Curtis, but has always maintained his innocence. In 2002, Roberson found his daughter unresponsive and took her to hospital. He claimed she had fallen off a bed in the family’s house in the east Texas city of Palestine.
Throughout the original trial, medical professionals gave evidence that Nikki’s demise was in line with shaken baby syndrome, a situation where a child endures serious harm from being violently jostled back and forth.
(Image: Innocence Project/AFP via Getty)
Roberson was scheduled to be killed by lethal injection on October 17 but hours before his execution the Supreme Court intervened and extended his life by a few months. Now there’s a fierce legal battle ongoing, with a group of Texas lawmakers and medical experts jostling to save Roberson.
They say Roberson’s conviction was based on faulty scientific evidence, with new evidence showing his daughter died from complications related to pneumonia.
The Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence of the Texas House of Representatives is set to hear Roberson’s testimony today. Ahead of giving his side to the story, Roberson issued a statement which praised God and gave thanks to his supporters, CBS reports.
In 2002, despite Roberson claiming his daughter was ill with a fever and had fallen from bed, alarmed health professionals immediately diagnosed her with suspected abuse based on her injuries – consistent at the time with the now-discredited shaken baby syndrome.
Medics noted at the time Roberson was unemotional, which was viewed later as evidence of his guilt. Advocates of the inmate claimed this was a manifestation of Roberson’s autism which went undiagnosed until 2018.
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