Texas Supreme Court Rules that a New Execution Date Can be Set for Robert Roberson

In a November 15, 2024, rul­ing, the Texas Supreme Court cleared the way for the state to resched­ule the exe­cu­tion of Robert Roberson, despite com­pelling evi­dence of his inno­cence and wide­spread sup­port for a new tri­al. Mr. Roberson was sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed October 17, but on October 16 the Texas House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence issued a sub­poe­na for Mr. Roberson to tes­ti­fy on a day after his exe­cu­tion was to occur. A dis­trict court tem­porar­i­ly halt­ed the exe­cu­tion so that Mr. Roberson could tes­ti­fy, and the state appealed.

In its opin­ion, the Texas Supreme Court ruled that the leg­isla­tive committee’s sub­poe­na over­stepped its pow­er. Justice Evan Young wrote that the Court ​“con­clud­ed that under these cir­cum­stances the committee’s author­i­ty to com­pel tes­ti­mo­ny does not include the pow­er to over­ride the sched­uled legal process lead­ing to an exe­cu­tion.” The Court added that ​“cat­e­gor­i­cal­ly pri­or­i­tiz­ing a leg­isla­tive sub­poe­na over a sched­uled execution…would become a potent legal tool that could be wield­ed not just to obtain nec­es­sary tes­ti­mo­ny but to fore­stall an execution.”

A new exe­cu­tion date may be set for Mr. Roberson no soon­er than 90 days after the first exe­cu­tion war­rant expired (October 17, 2024). Lawmakers are still attempt­ing to call Mr. Roberson to tes­ti­fy in per­son before the com­mit­tee, an effort the Court said should be pos­si­ble. ​“If the com­mit­tee still wish­es to obtain [Mr. Roberson’s] tes­ti­mo­ny, we assume that the depart­ment can rea­son­ably accom­mo­date a new sub­poe­na,” wrote Justice Young. The Court added that ​“so long as a sub­poe­na issues in a way that does not inevitably block a sched­uled exe­cu­tion, noth­ing in our hold­ing pre­vents the com­mit­tee from pur­su­ing judi­cial relief in the ordi­nary way to com­pel a wit­ness­es’ tes­ti­mo­ny.” In a joint state­ment released after the Court’s deci­sion, Committee Chairman Moody and mem­ber Jeff Leach said that ​“the Supreme Court strong­ly rein­forced our belief that our Committee can indeed obtain Mr. Roberson’s tes­ti­mo­ny and made clear that it expects the Executive Branch of gov­ern­ment to accom­mo­date us in doing so.” The leg­is­la­tors added that they ​“look for­ward to work­ing with the Executive Branch to do just that.”

The Texas Supreme Court did not address the ques­tion of Mr. Roberson’s inno­cence in its deci­sion. Gretchen Sween, Mr. Roberson’s attor­ney, urged the state to refrain from set­ting a new exe­cu­tion date because of ​“the over­whelm­ing new evi­dence of inno­cence” that has emerged since his tri­al. Mr. Roberson has main­tained his inno­cence in the 2002 death of his 2‑year-old daugh­ter, Nikki.

Following new devel­op­ments in sci­en­tif­ic under­stand­ing, med­ical experts have now deter­mined that Nikki died not from abuse but from a com­bi­na­tion of pneu­mo­nia, an acci­den­tal fall, and inap­pro­pri­ate med­ica­tions. No court has con­sid­ered the full breadth of the new evi­dence at hand.