<\/p>\n
Robert Roberson, an East Texas man facing execution for the death of his 2-year-old daughter, smiles durning an interview with the Dallas Morning News at the TDCJ Polunsky Unit in Livingston, TX on Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2025.<\/p>\n
Juan Figueroa\/Staff Photographer<\/p>\n
A Georgia man has been granted a new trial in a shaken baby syndrome case, a ruling\u00a0Robert Roberson\u2019s attorneys<\/a> are urging a Texas <\/a>judge to consider as he weighs whether Roberson should receive a hearing that could lead to a new trial of his own.<\/p>\n In court documents obtained Tuesday by\u00a0The Dallas Morning News, Roberson\u2019s legal team outlined recent developments in the case of Danyel Smith. Smith\u2019s conviction was vacated last month in Gwinnett County, Georgia, after a judge concluded changes in science undercut the integrity of his conviction.<\/p>\n Roberson\u2019s attorneys argued Smith and Roberson\u2019s cases share striking similarities: Both were convicted in 2003 in cases rooted in shaken baby syndrome. Both involved male caregivers who brought injured children to hospitals seeking medical care. And both men refused to accept plea deals in exchange for lesser sentences, stating they would not admit to crimes they didn\u2019t commit.\u00a0<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Smith, who was convicted of killing his 2-month-old son Chandler, was sentenced to life in prison. Roberson, convicted for the murder of his 2-year-old daughter, Nikki, was sentenced to death. \u00a0<\/p>\n Related: They were exonerated in shaken baby cases. Can their podcast help save Robert Roberson?<\/a><\/p>\n Beginning in the late 1960s, scientists posited that shaking infants<\/a> could cause a potentially lethal combination of blood pooling between the brain and the skull, brain swelling and bleeding in or behind the eyes. That hypothesis soon became a legitimate diagnosis, and the triad of symptoms was believed to be enough to say a child had been intentionally injured.<\/p>\n The medical determination \u2014 now more commonly referred to as \u201cabusive head trauma\u201d \u2014 has since come under wide scrutiny by experts, and the Georgia court noted modern medical standards now require physicians to consider alternative explanations for a child\u2019s injuries.\u00a0<\/p>\n In Smith\u2019s case, attorneys have said evidence shows his son\u2019s death was due to medical complications stemming from his premature birth<\/a>. Roberson’s attorneys, meanwhile, have argued Nikki, who was chronically ill, died of natural and accidental causes, including severe, undiagnosed pneumonia and a fall from bed.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n \u201cMr. Smith\u2019s evidence presents an alternative medical explanation for Chandler\u2019s death that is so material it would probably produce a different outcome,\u201d reads the order granting Smith a new trial.<\/p>\n Roberson\u2019s legal team said that conclusion mirrors the standard Texas courts must apply when considering claims under the state\u2019s \u201cjunk science\u201d law, which allows people to contest their convictions based on new scientific evidence.<\/p>\n Related: Robert Roberson asks court to consider New Jersey\u2019s landmark shaken baby ruling<\/a><\/p>\n Roberson, who has been on death row for more than two decades, has repeatedly sought relief under the law. An Anderson County judge ruled against him as recently as 2022, stating after a lengthy evidentiary hearing that he failed to show shaken baby syndrome was “discredited and no longer an accepted medical diagnosis.”<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n The 59-year-old is currently awaiting a decision on whether he will receive another evidentiary hearing, a process that started after Roberson\u2019s third stay of execution in October 2025. The stay was granted in light of an overturned conviction in a similar shaken baby case out of Dallas County.\u00a0<\/p>\n Considered a \u201cnotice of persuasive authority,\u201d Tuesday\u2019s filing is not binding, but a court can choose to rely on and follow the decisions made by other jurisdictions. Roberson\u2019s attorneys filed a similar notice late last year following a landmark ruling out of New Jersey <\/a>that deemed shaken baby syndrome testimony inadmissible.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Robert Roberson, an East Texas man facing execution for the death of his 2-year-old daughter, smiles durning an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":403951,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[294,2315,27,29,28,92331],"class_list":["post-403950","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-crime","tag-death-penalty","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news","tag-tp-courts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403950","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=403950"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403950\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/403951"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=403950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=403950"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=403950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n