Ken Paxton releases records to ‘correct falsehoods’ about Robert Roberson case

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton on Wednesday issued his first public remarks affirming the prosecution’s case against Robert Roberson III, the death row inmate whose execution was stayed last week after an unprecedented legal maneuver by a bipartisan group of lawmakers.

In the evening statement that was released on X, via email and his office’s website, Paxton said he released the autopsy report and a sworn affidavit of the medical examiner who performed Roberson’s daughter’s autopsy to correct “lies” about the case coming from state Reps. Jeff Leach, R-Plano, and Joe Moody, D-El Paso.

Roberson, an East Texas man, was convicted in 2003 for the death of his 2-year-old daughter, Nikki. He has maintained his innocence since his trial.

The 57-year-old was scheduled to be executed on Oct. 17 by lethal injection in Huntsville, but a bipartisan group of lawmakers carried out a novel legal maneuver that resulted in the state Supreme Court staying the execution.

Roberson’s attorneys and lawmakers, including half of the Republican-controlled House, argue his case was based on shaken baby syndrome, a medical determination that abuse has caused serious or fatal head trauma.

Gretchen Sween, one of Roberson’s defense attorneys, said in an emailed statement: “Tonight, a profoundly disturbing thing happened: The chief law enforcement office of the State of Texas, the OAG, issued a stunningly misleading statement designed to quash a bipartisan group of lawmakers in their truth-seeking mission, which has riveted the world. Why the urgency to execute an innocent, autistic man, with a perfect disciplinary record during the 22 years he has been confined on Texas’s death row, largely without any lawyer willing to investigate his claim of innocence?”

Until Wednesday, Paxton had not publicly commented on the case. This past weekend, he filed a petition with the Texas Supreme Court asking for the order granting the subpoena to be reversed, which was later denied.

But in his news release, Paxton said: “The Office of the Attorney General released the original autopsy report and other evidence to correct falsehoods amplified by a coalition interfering with the capital punishment proceedings in which Robert Roberson was scheduled to be executed for the murder of his two-year-old daughter Nikki.”

In the statement, Paxton said Nikki had multiple injuries when she was brought in to the emergency room that showed blunt force trauma rather than solely shaken baby syndrome, echoing Paxton’s statements in the petition from over the weekend. Paxton said in the statement that Roberson had a history of abuse to both Nikki and his ex-wife, and said that Nikki died due to being beaten by Roberson.

Paxton also alleged in his statement that evidence showed Roberson had sexually abused Nikki. Roberson was never charged with sexually abusing his daughter.

The Dallas Morning News is in the process of reviewing the 1,000-plus pages of court transcripts from Roberson’s original 2003 trial and his appeals.

Paxton also criticized the efforts of the House members to delay Roberson’s execution. Paxton said the House members attempted to mislead the public by “falsely claiming“ Roberson was unfairly convicted through “junk science” based on the shaken baby theory.

In a post on X, Moody said the House committee heard days of testimony from law, medical and psychology experts, as well as the lead investigator and a juror in the case.

“There are no new facts in the OAG’s statement, only a collection of exaggerations, misrepresentations and full-on untruths completely divorced from fact and context,” Moody said. “We intend to provide a response tomorrow that will completely undermine it. We will continue to act on truth in pursuit of justice and the rule of law.”

The diagnosis has come under broad scrutiny in the years since the conviction. Roberson’s attorneys and lawmakers have said the state’s 2013 “junk science” law should have been an avenue to vacate Roberson’s conviction.

Anderson County’s district attorney and the attorney general contend shaken baby syndrome was not central to securing the conviction. Since then, multiple courts have declined to intervene in subsequent appeals.

Roberson’s execution was stayed at the last minute after the Texas House Committee of Criminal Jurisprudence, of which Moody is the chair and Leach is a member, issued a subpoena the day before calling for Roberson to testify before the committee regarding his case.

Staff writer Aarón Torres contributed to this report.