AUSTIN (Nexstar) — After a dramatic, last-hour legal battle and an unprecedented stay of execution, Texas death row inmate Robert Roberson is set to testify to his innocence in front of House lawmakers in person at the Capitol on Monday.
In a last-hour ruling Thursday night, the Texas Supreme Court halted Roberson’s execution scheduled for that evening. Lawmakers subpoenaed Roberson to testify in front of the House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee at a date after his execution in an effort to delay his death. The court ruled the Texas Department of Criminal Justice must honor that subpoena.
Roberson was convicted in 2003 of murdering his 2-year-old daughter. He has maintained his innocence ever since, and a bipartisan majority of the Texas House is demanding a new trial in light of new medical evidence that could exonerate him.
His testimony will assist lawmakers’ inquiry regarding whether courts are properly adhering to Texas’ 2013 “junk science” law, which allows for new trials in cases where scientific evidence is later found faulty. In Roberson’s case, medical experts testified Wednesday that the “shaken baby syndrome” hypothesis under which Roberson was convicted is now bad science. Instead, they say there is considerable evidence that Roberson’s daughter died of natural causes — not homicide.
“I want him to be able to tell his story, what his life was like prior to this, what the investigation looked like through his lens,” House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee Chair Joe Moody, D-El Paso, told Nexstar. “We want to hear from him. He’s an autistic man who can, I think, shed light on his experience, and the legislature can use that information to make the decisions that we need to make going forward in making policy to let us do our job. And so I’m just grateful that the court respected our authority to issue that subpoena.”
Moody said their novel legal move is unprecedented, and no death row inmate has ever been granted the privilege to leave prison to testify in public. He is arranging the complicated logistics with TDCJ and the Department of Public Safety, he said.
“Every case is very unique. This one is extremely unique because of the proximity and time to Mr. Roberson’s execution. So I anticipate that this was unprecedented for a reason. It’s because these situations don’t arise very often,” Moody said.
Late Thursday night, a group of lawmakers stood in solidarity with Roberson in Huntsville as he learned the news he would wake up on Friday morning.
“Being there, it was, you know, a roller coaster of emotions,” State Rep. John Bucy (D-Cedar Park) said, describing the scene outside the prison in Huntsville. Bucy said he and State Rep. Lacey Hull (R-Houston) were there to show support and tell Roberson’s story.
“There were times throughout the night, as it went back and forth that we were getting very concerned that the execution would move forward and that we would have to go be a witness to that and then go talk about it and what it meant for the state of Texas,” Bucy said.
“He was shocked, to say the least,” TDCJ Communications Director Amanda Hernandez said, telling reporters how Roberson responded to news his execution would not go forward. “He praised God, and he thanked his supporters.”
Bucy hopes the effort from lawmakers leads to a new look at the evidence in the case.
“We should apologize to this man and send him home. I think that’s the best-case scenario,” Bucy said. “But I also think another day in court to get to look at the science and truly look at it, not to push it away or act like it’s hearsay, but actually look at the evidence. I think everyone that does that will change their mind about this case.”
This is Roberson’s second execution date. In 2016, the Court of Criminal Appeals halted his execution one week before he was scheduled to go to the death chamber. The appeals court sent the case back to the trial court in Anderson County for review.
On Wednesday, Anderson County District Attorney Allyson Mitchell testified via Zoom to the House Criminal Jurisprudence committee. She defended the case against Roberson.
“Based on the totality of the evidence as stated, a murder took place here,” Mitchell told committee members. “Mr. Roberson took the life of his almost three-year-old daughter.”
Mitchell said Roberson’s attorneys presented their new evidence to a judge at a hearing in 2021. The judge rejected Roberson’s claims, determining that a new trial was not warranted. After that determination, the Court of Criminal Appeals denied the request to overturn Roberson’s conviction.
U.S. citizens removed from Texas voter rolls in purge targeting potential non-citizens
Ahead of this year’s election, Texas Governor Greg Abbott boasted about the state purging thousands of non-citizens from the voter rolls. But an investigative report from ProPublica, the Texas Tribune and Votebeat found some U.S. citizens got swept into that purge.
Texas Tribune politics reporter James Barragán is part of the team behind the report. He spoke with Ryan Chandler during this week’s State of Texas politics program.
Ryan Chandler: Your reporting found that of the approximately 6,500 non-citizens that the governor reported, there were some American citizens, and that number of non-citizens was pretty inflated. Can you take us through how you arrived at the number you did?
James Barragán: Well, the first thing to say about this is that these numbers are very complicated, which is why experts warn against using them as definitive numbers. So when we saw the governor saying 6,500 non-citizens have been removed from the voter rolls, we immediately had our antenna up. What we did was go to counties, which are the ones that actually removed the voters from the voter rolls, and asked for records requests for the people who had been removed. Among those people, we contacted 70, and at least 10 of those we have talked to and verified are U.S. citizens, and there are more that we haven’t talked to who we have been able to verify their birth certificate. So there’s definitely been a mix up here where U.S. citizens are being counted as part of these non-citizens.
Ryan Chandler: And as part of this investigation, you spoke to voters who are citizens who maybe didn’t even know that they were off the voter rolls. What were they telling you when they found out that they were swept up in this?
James Barragán: Well, yeah, they were incredibly surprised. Some of them had no idea that they had been taken off the voter rolls. The most surprising thing for them was receiving a phone call from a reporter, and that being the first time they were being notified that they were taken off the rolls. You can imagine their surprise.
Ryan Chandler: What can they do to fix that, though, now that they know?
James Barragán: Well, it’s a big question, but the voting rights experts that we have talked to have said, even if you have missed the deadline, even if you’ve missed that October 7 deadline, and you believe that your application or your voter registration was taken off the voter rolls by by a mistake, if you are at the polls or even in any situation, you should try to remedy that situation, and you should have a right to vote. So their advice is always, as always, stay at the polls. Show them your proof of citizenship. Show them your proof of documentation, and you should be allowed to vote.
Ryan Chandler: Do we have any indication of how many American citizens are dealing with that right now? How many were affected by this?
James Barragán: We don’t know. I mean, the big thing is that our investigation found that only 581 of those are confirmed non-citizens, according to the state, so there are potentially thousands of people who just simply did not respond to these notifications from the counties, and could be in this very situation.
Ryan Chandler: Have you spoken to the Governor’s office about this or the Secretary of State? I’m sure that they were concerned to learn this.
James Barragán: Yes, in our due diligence, we’ve reached out to every state official involved in this, the attorney general’s office, the governor’s office and the Secretary of State. The only one that has really responded to us is the Secretary of State, and they have cooperated with our investigation to try to give us the information we need to do this, and we continue to work with them as we continue to work on follow up stories
Ryan Chandler: The Governor is quick to advertise when he’s found purported non-citizens, but when you may have found a mistake, he hasn’t responded to that.
James Barragán: It’s a little bit troubling, yeah, because the claim is big, and what our story was saying is that it creates this situation of distrust in our elections, which is a terrible thing to have two weeks out from an election. And so I think it is incumbent on the governor’s office to come out and potentially clarify some of this information, which we have proven and the Secretary of State has confirmed is incorrect.
Allred, Cruz and the importance of independents in the race for U.S. Senate
With election day quickly approaching, the Texas Politics Project’s October poll has incumbent Republican Sen. Ted Cruz seven points ahead of Democratic challenger U.S. Rep. Colin Allred, which is just outside the poll’s margin of error.
Cruz polled at 51%, while Allred polled at 44%. Libertarian candidate Ted Brown came in at 4%.
According to James Henson, executive director of the Texas Politics Project, Allred’s polling is very similar to where Beto O’Rourke was at this point in the 2018 Senate race when he ran against Cruz.
“O’Rourke in ‘18, Allred in ‘24 in October, they look very similar among independents, people with loose party attachments, only eight or 9% of the electorate probably (are) true independents,” Henson said. “I think if you’re Colin Allred, you feel like that’s a pretty good sign with a few weeks to go.”
Many Democrats still don’t have a strong opinion of Allred, Henson said, and in the Texas Politics Project’s favorability poll, about 17% of Democrats were not committed to Allred.
“That’s room for growth, but it’s also the classic democratic problem of having hard to reach voters and maybe lacking some of the wherewithal to actually get to them,” Henson said.
Cruz and Allred met Tuesday in Dallas for the only Senate debate ahead of the election. The night served as an opportunity for both candidates to make an impression on undecided voters.
“I think for Allred the challenge was to become known to those who haven’t been paying attention or are just now tuning in,” Moritz said. “I think his biggest moment was when he basically said, I was ready to do battle with the insurrectionists. And Senator Cruz was hiding in a closet. I think if people were just looking at, is this guy up to the task? Does he have the wherewithal to be a fighter for Texas? I think that was probably his best chance to do that.”
Both Cruz and Allred tried to reach across the aisle to voters of the opposite party during Tuesday’s debate.
According to John Moritz, chief politics reporter for the Austin American-Statesman, this kind of crossover in Texas goes back to the 1950s.
“The key here is, for Allred, it reinforces his message that he is the most bipartisan member of the Texas delegation, and, for Cruz, it softens the notion that he is this hard right partisan, no compromise, take no prisoners,” Moritz said.
Abortion and transgender rights were key issues discussed in Tuesday’s debate.
Cruz said Texas’ abortion law should be determined by the state legislature.
“In Texas, we overwhelmingly support that parents should be notified and have to consent before their child gets an abortion,” Cruz said. “In Texas, we overwhelmingly agree that late-term abortions in the eighth and ninth months — that’s too extreme, and I’ll tell you, in Texas, we overwhelmingly agree that taxpayer money shouldn’t pay for abortions.”
Allred referenced the stories of Texas women, including that of Amanda Zurawski who, despite having pregnancy complications, was denied an abortion. He said he supports codifying Roe v Wade.
“To every Texas woman at home and every Texas family watching this, understand that when Ted Cruz says he’s pro-life, he doesn’t mean yours,” Allred said.
While there isn’t one dominant issue Democrats are interested in, abortion ranks in the top three, Henson said.
“I wasn’t surprised to see Colin Allred want to talk about that, nor was I surprised to see Ted Cruz not want to talk about that, because where abortion policies in the state right now has kind of gotten ahead of where Republican public opinion is,” Henson said.
Appeals court removes federal judge in longstanding Texas foster care case
An appeals court has ordered the removal of the federal judge who has overseen the legal fight over foster care in Texas for more than a decade.
In its ruling released Oct. 11, a panel of three judges of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals granted the state’s request to remove U.S. District Judge Janis Jack and reassign the case because of her “intemperate conduct on the bench.” The ruling also reversed the hundreds of thousands of dollars in daily fines Jack recently ordered the state pay for contempt of court.
Since 2011, when the lawsuit was filed on behalf of thousands of children in the permanent care of the state, Jack has demanded change from the defendants, which include Gov. Greg Abbott and the leaders of the state agencies in charge of child welfare — Health and Human Services and the Department of Family and Protective Services. Over the years, the district judge appointed a team of monitors to survey the state’s progress, and her aforementioned order marked the third time she held the state in contempt for failing to meet some of her specific, court-ordered reforms.
However, in its ruling, the 5th Circuit panel called for the case to be reassigned, saying Jack’s “highly antagonistic demeanor” toward the state and its attorneys could call into doubt at least “the appearance of fairness” in the case.
The ruling also detailed several tense exchanges between Jack and the state from recent proceedings — including a time when Jack said she should sentence the agency leaders to live in one of the places where the state was housing children in its care.
“The above excerpts show that the judge exhibits a sustained pattern, over the course of months and numerous hearings, of disrespect for the Defendants and their counsel, but no such attitude toward the Plaintiffs’ counsel,” wrote Judge Edith Jones, joined by Judges Edith Clement and Cory Wilson, in the 5th Circuit’s ruling.
Paul Yetter, the plaintiffs’ attorney representing the children in this case, said the ruling marked a “sad day for Texas children.” In a statement, he said, “For over a decade, Judge Jack pushed the state to fix its broken system. She deserves a medal for what she’s done. We will keep fighting to ensure these children are safe.”
Yetter went on to say he plans to appeal the decision for a hearing before the full appeals court.
The 5th Circuit ruling noted the progress Texas has made on reforming the system, as well as the cost — noting it spent $150 million to comply with Jack’s reforms and another $60 million on the court monitors.
A spokesperson for the Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) said in a statement, “We are pleased the Fifth Circuit recognized the significant efforts DFPS and HHSC have invested in serving the children and families of our state. We remain committed and are grateful to Governor Abbott and the Texas Legislature for their continued support in furthering the well-being of our most vulnerable Texans.”