Texas high court blocks execution of Robert Roberson after novel legal move by lawmakers

HUNTSVILLE, Texas – The Texas Supreme Court late Thursday night blocked the execution of Robert Roberson III, directing state officials to allow the death row inmate to comply with a subpoena issued by a House committee for his testimony.

The order capped a string of court hearings in Austin as the Texas Department of Criminal Justice prepared to put Roberson to death more than 100 miles away in Huntsville.

In a brief order issued around 9:40 p.m., the high court said state corrections officials were temporarily barred from impairing Roberson’s ability to comply with a subpoena, issued a day earlier, to appear before the Texas House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee, including by executing Roberson, “until further order of this Court.”

The evening ruling by the Texas Supreme Court does not vacate the conviction; more legal sparring in a lower court will follow in the coming weeks as the parties work to resolve the separation-of-powers issue.

Earlier in the day, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals cleared the way for the execution to proceed, overruling an order by state District Judge Jessica Mangrum in Travis County that halted the state’s plans.

After the Travis County hearing, the Texas Attorney General’s Office swiftly appealed to the state’s highest criminal court. The lawmakers on the House committee then appealed to the Texas Supreme Court.

In a joint statement, Rep. Jeff Leach, R-Plano, and Rep. Joe Moody, D-El Paso, marked the high court’s order as a legal victory that corrects how they say the criminal justice system – at multiple levels – has fallen short in Roberson’s case.

“And while some courthouses may have failed him, the Texas House has not,” the statement reads. “We’re deeply grateful to the Texas Supreme Court for respecting the role of the Texas legislature in such consequential matters. We look forward to welcoming Robert to the Texas Capitol, and along with 31 million Texans, finally giving him – and the truth – a chance to be heard.”

The attorney general did not respond to an emailed inquiry after the order.

“After being told about the stay, (Roberson) praised God and thanked his supporters,” Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokesperson Amanda Hernandez said in a statement late Thursday.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday had rejected an appeal by Roberson’s attorneys, again declining to halt the execution.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor urged Gov. Greg Abbott to issue a 30-day pause – an ask that echoed calls from Roberson’s attorney and some Texas lawmakers.

Spokespeople for Abbott didn’t respond to three text messages requesting comment Thursday.

Texas was slated to put Roberson, 57, to death Thursday in what would have been an unprecedented execution of a disabled man convicted of killing his daughter based on scrutinized science.

Roberson – who has maintained his innocence while on death row for more than two decades – was sentenced to death in 2003 for reportedly fatally shaking his 2-year-old daughter, Nikki. He was scheduled to be executed by lethal injection in Huntsville.

If put to death, Roberson, who is autistic, will become the first person in the country to be executed in a “shaken baby syndrome” case, lawmakers say.

The Texas House committee wants Roberson to testify Monday at a hearing about how a state’s “junk science” law allowing people to challenge convictions with new science was applied in his case.

During the Travis County hearing, Leach and Moody argued that Roberson’s testimony was needed to explore the law’s effectiveness and whether it was applied correctly.

Earlier in the day, more than a hundred miles away, a crowd of TV cameras and reporters descended on a grassy lawn in front of the Huntsville Unit’s red-brick main entrance. Corrections officers in gray uniforms surrounded the group, anticipating possible demonstrations from anti-death penalty groups.

Inside the unit, Roberson spent the early morning reading, packing his possessions and watching TV, according to an hour-by-hour schedule provided by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. At 11 a.m., Roberson was talking with a visitor.

Outside, a crowd of protesters had swelled into the afternoon hours. Among them were members of Roberson’s family, including his niece Monica Bradford and sister-in-law Jennifer Martin.

Bradford said she was putting her faith in God. She said she’d just gotten off a phone call with her uncle, who told her that his “faith is in Jesus.”

“I know my uncle is saved at the end of the day,” Bradford said.

Jennifer Martin, Roberson’s sister-in-law, fighting back tears and a huff in her voice, said she’s heartbroken, frustrated and confused following the Travis County judge’s intervention.

Earlier in the afternoon, Rep. John Bucy, D-Austin, said he planned to attend the execution in Huntsville if it went forward.

After the ruling, Bucy said the maneuver by the Legislature and the head-spinning flurry of motions, appeals and court opinions, was likely “traumatic” for Roberson. But, he said, Roberson recognizes the impact his testimony will have on other cases, making Thursday’s precedent “bigger than him.”

“For 22 years, this man has been held in prison on death row and we’re hoping that finally with this ruling … the Texas House will be able to bring to light the truths in this case,” Bucy said. “We believe this to be an innocent man.”

In a statement, Gretchen Sween, Roberson’s attorney, celebrated the order blocking the execution.

“The vast team fighting for Robert Roberson – people all across Texas, the country, and the world – are elated tonight that a contingent of brave, bipartisan Texas lawmakers chose to dig deep into the facts of Robert’s case that no court had yet considered and recognized that his life was worth fighting for,” Sween said. “He lives to fight another day and hopes that his experience can help improve the integrity of our criminal legal system.”

State Rep. Brian Harrison, R-Midlothian, said lawmakers were hopeful that Abbott, who was set to deliver remarks on border security in Corpus Christi later Thursday, would pause the execution.

“I spent a long time with the governor’s office last night,” Harrison told radio host Mark Davis on Thursday morning. “What I would say is very fruitful and productive discussions are happening.”

Harrison said Roberson needs a new trial because there was no direct evidence of abuse and Roberson’s own lawyer supported the shaken baby syndrome theory rather than arguing for his innocence. Roberson’s lawyers have made a slew of 11th-hour pleas to stop his execution, arguing the prosecution hinged on “junk science.”

When Roberson found Nikki unresponsive in 2002, court documents say he rushed her blue, limp body to a Palestine hospital. Roberson said she fell from a bed, but medical staff suspected child abuse and called police because of her injuries, which included bruises on her face, a bump on the back of her head and bleeding outside her brain. Her cause of death was ruled to be blunt-force head injuries.

The case against Roberson – who had just become Nikki’s sole caretaker – relied on doctors’ testimony that her death was consistent with shaken baby syndrome, when an infant is severely injured from being violently shaken.

Roberson’s lawyers have said new evidence shows Nikki, who was chronically ill, died of natural and accidental causes, including “severe, undiagnosed” pneumonia. According to court documents, she had a 104.5-degree fever days before she died; her medical history included chronic infections undeterred by multiple strains of antibiotics and “alarming breathing apnea spells.”

During the Travis County hearing, Assistant Attorney General Ed Marshall, an attorney with the attorney general’s office, said the case was not a “shaken baby” case and argued the Court of Criminal Appeals had exclusive jurisdiction.

“The evidence supports the fact there were multiple blunt force impacts to the child’s head, and there was a history of abuse from this particular inmate against this child,” Marshall said during the hearing. “Shaken baby syndrome just doesn’t play a role in this case, so whether or not it’s been discredited in the community of pediatrics specialists – it’s just not the central feature of this case.”