Robert Roberson murder case: What you should know about the evidence

People who believe Roberson is guilty have also repeatedly claimed that he sexually abused Nikki.

But only one nurse made that accusation: Andrea Sims, who said at trial that she was a certified sexual assault expert before later admitting under cross-examination that she was, in fact, not certified.

Roberson's attorneys and Brian Wharton, the case's lead investigator, said Sims examined Nikki for signs of sexual abuse without being asked to do so by law enforcement.

Sims testified she saw three anal fissures that led her to conclude it was sexual abuse. The prosecutor then asked her to give testimony to the jury about pedophilia and anal sex.

Squires, the Dallas pediatrician, refuted Sims' conclusion, saying she observed a tear and considered it typical of an infant.

Even after the prosecutor dropped the charge as a reason for the death penalty, he addressed sexual abuse in his closing statement to the jury.

Roberson's attorneys condemned the sexual abuse allegation as unfounded and damaging to Roberson's trial, noting that the state presented no evidence beyond Sims' testimony. They added that Nikki had been struggling with diarrhea in the week before her death.

“I think there's a reckless and dangerous buzz going around on the Internet right now about Roberson sexually abusing Nikki and doing other things to her,” Rep. Brian Harrison, R-Midlothian, said Oct. 21.

He asked Salzman, who supported Roberson's appeals, whether there has “ever been a shred of substantive evidence to support this claim.”

“Absolutely not,” Salzman said.

In his Oct. 23 release, Paxton also detailed a prison informant's claim that Roberson had admitted to abusing Nikki – an account that even prosecutors did not provide during the trial.

“By including this information, the [attorney general’s office] has repeated a lie, at best with complete indifference to the truth,” the lawmakers wrote in their rebuttal. “The 'prison snitch' here spun a story so completely contradictory to the evidence that prosecutors did not use it at trial.”