3 days Ago
Texas is set to become the first state in the country to execute someone convicted for causing a brain injury commonly known as "shaken baby syndrome." Its highest criminal court declined to stop the Oct. 17 execution of a man named Robert Roberson, even after his team argued that the cause of his victim's death, now known as abusive head trauma (AHT), was based on since-debunked pseudoscience.
And while Texas passed a first-of-its-kind "junk science law" a decade ago for situations like this, Roberson will not benefit from it. Questioning the validity of shaken baby syndrome Roberson has maintained his innocence from death row ever since he was convicted of killing his two-year-old daughter, Nikki Curtis, in 2002. His attorneys said they have uncovered new evidence in previously hidden medical records that indicate she died from severe pneumonia.
Also, in the decades since Roberson's trial, the theory behind AHT has "been entirely exposed as devoid of any scientific underpinnings," his team said in the recently denied motion for a stay of execution. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals previously halted his execution in 2016 and sent his case back to trial court after the "scientific consensus around shaken baby syndrome diagnoses came into question," said the Texas Tribune . That appeal came three years after a state law passed allowing Texas courts to overturn convictions if the "scientific.
.. Theara Coleman, The Week US.
