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The Texas Supreme Court ruled Friday that a legislative subpoena cannot be used to halt an execution after Republican and Democratic lawmakers used the new maneuver to pause Robert Roberson’s lethal injection at the last minute.

The ruling dealt with a subpoena issued for Roberson by the Texas House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee last month that was seen as a way to delay his execution.

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But the Supreme Court ruled that “under these circumstances, the committee’s power to compel testimony does not include the power to override the scheduled judicial process leading to an execution,” wrote Republican Judge Evan Young, who issued the court’s opinion.

Roberson was scheduled to die by lethal injection on Oct. 17 when lawmakers, in a last-ditch effort, issued a subpoena to get him to testify at the Texas Capitol days after his scheduled execution.

A new execution date for Roberson has not been set, but it is certain to move forward unless Gov. Greg Abbott grants a 30-day stay

This spurred a legal conundrum between the state’s criminal and civil courts, ultimately leading to the Texas Supreme Court temporarily ruling in Roberson’s favor.

Roberson, who was sentenced to death in 2003 for killing his 2-year-old daughter, Nikki Curtis. He has received bipartisan support from lawmakers and medical experts who say he was convicted of faulty evidence of “shaken baby syndrome,” which refers to a severe brain injury caused when a child’s head is damaged by shaking or some other violent impact, such as being slapped against a wall or thrown on the floor.

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Roberson would be the first person in the United States to be executed for killing a child in this manner.

Rope. Joe Moody, who has led the effort to stop Roberson’s execution, said that delaying execution with the subpoena was “never our specific intent” and added that the court “correctly agreed” that the subpoena and subpoena were valid.

Moody insisted that Roberson could still be called to testify because the court order “reinforced our belief that the committee can indeed obtain Mr. Roberson’s testimony and made clear that it expects the executive branch of the government to accommodate us in doing so.”

Prosecutors said Roberson killed his daughter by violently shaking her back and forth. Roberson’s attorneys have argued that the child’s symptoms were not consistent with child abuse and that she likely died of complications from severe pneumonia.

His case has drawn support from nearly 90 lawmakers across party lines and civil rights advocates who say Roberson is innocent and has not received a fair trial under the state’s “junk science” law. The statute allows people convicted of a crime under outdated science to have their sentence vacated. The 2013 law was hailed as progressive and the first of its kind, but civil rights advocates say the state’s highest criminal court is not using the law as it should for people facing execution.

The Supreme Court, which handles civil matters, made clear that it was not deciding whether Roberson was guilty or innocent of capital murder or the evidence at issue. Those questions rest with the criminal courts, which have so far rejected Robinson’s appeals, the Supreme Court said.

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