Robert Roberson has been on Texas death row for 22 years for 'shaken baby syndrome,' a diagnosis that the medical community now says cannot be reliably made

In 2002, Robert Roberson was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death in Anderson County, Texas, for the death of his two-year-old daughter Nikki. The prosecution's case rested on the diagnosis of shaken baby syndrome (SBS): the presence of a triad of symptoms (subdural hemorrhage, retinal hemorrhage, and brain swelling) was treated as conclusive proof that a caretaker had violently shaken the child. Since Roberson's conviction, the medical and scientific understanding of this triad has fundamentally changed. Research has shown that the same symptoms can result from short falls, naturally occurring medical conditions, infections, and accidental traumas. At least two dozen medical and forensic professionals who previously supported SBS diagnoses have publicly reversed their positions. Roberson came within two hours of execution on October 17, 2024, before a bipartisan group of Texas lawmakers intervened with subpoenas and the Texas Supreme Court issued a last-minute stay. In October 2025, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals granted an emergency stay of execution and remanded his case to the trial court. As of early 2026, his case remains pending. Meanwhile, since 1992, 41 parents or caregivers have been exonerated of murder, manslaughter, or child abuse charges that were based on SBS diagnoses, according to the National Registry of Exonerations. But a review of more than 1,400 appellate rulings between 2008 and 2018 found that only 3% of SBS convictions were overturned, far lower than the reversal rate for other types of wrongful convictions. Unknown numbers of parents and caregivers remain in prison based on a medical diagnosis the scientific community no longer considers reliable. This problem persists because the legal system has no efficient mechanism for revisiting convictions when the underlying science changes. Texas has a 'junk science' writ (Article 11.073 of the Code of Criminal Procedure) that theoretically allows defendants to challenge convictions based on discredited forensic methods, but the process requires individual litigation for each case, costs tens of thousands of dollars, and depends on finding willing attorneys and sympathetic judges. Prosecutors who obtained the original convictions have institutional incentives to defend them rather than concede error. The medical establishment, while evolving in its understanding, has not issued a definitive consensus statement that would force courts to act. The result is a slow, case-by-case process where individual defendants must prove that the science changed, even when the entire medical community acknowledges it did.