How a Podcast Could Spare the Life of a Convicted Death Row Inmate

The state of Texas is set to execute 58-year-old Robert Roberson next week, but his attorneys have filed a last minute request for a new trial based on a recent Dateline podcast. Roberson would be the first person to ever be put to death for shaken baby syndrome, following the 2002 death of his 2 year old daughter Nikki. The science he was convicted on is no longer regarded and is considered “junk science.”  That information alone brought lawmakers from both sides of the aisle to intervene last year, to stay his execution, but that stay is up and Roberson time is up. Now, baby Nikki’s maternal grandfather is speaking up, telling a story, if true, of egregious conduct by the judge in this case from the hospital where Nikki died, all the way to the courtroom he presided over in Roberson’s trial.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.