AUSTIN, Texas — A woman convicted of murder in Travis County nearly 20 years ago could get a new trial.
The Travis County District Attorney's Office is reviewing the 2005 conviction of Carmen Mejia. She's serving a life sentence for the death of a 10-month-old baby – but medical experts say the child's death could have been an accident and her conviction may have been based on so-called "junk science."
KVUE has a crew at the Travis County Courthouse for a hearing in Mejia's case on Monday. This article will be updated with the latest information as soon as it becomes available.
Background on this case
At the time of the incident in 2003, investigators said Mejia intentionally submerged the 10-month-old baby in scalding hot bath water. It was also alleged that to cover up her actions, she failed to promptly get the baby medical care afterward, resulting in his death.
In 2005, Mejia was convicted of murder, injury to a child with serious bodily injury, and injury to a child by omission. She was sentenced to life in prison without parole.
According to the DA's office, at her trial, the primary scientific evidence presented by prosecutors was that the pattern of the burns indicated they were inflicted intentionally. State experts also testified that they believed that the evidence proved the scalding was intentional. The DA's office said the experts were a non-medical burn expert and the emergency room doctor who treated the child.
Mejia's defense argued that older children who were present at the home at the time of the incident had attempted to give the baby a bath and that because the hot water gauge was set "dangerously high," the baby was burned when one of the older children accidentally turned the wrong handle.
The DA's office said at a previous hearing, a witness who was a child at the time testified that she turned on the faucet when the baby was in the bathtub – and that when she did that, Mejia wasn't in the room.
The DA's office said when given this new information, both original state experts swore affidavits that they could no longer say that the injuries were caused intentionally. The medical examiner who performed the autopsy on the child also reviewed the new information and changed her opinion on the manner of death from "homicide" to "accident."
At Monday's hearing, the state will present the affidavits to the court. Two witnesses are also expected to testify: a medical expert on burn patterns and an expert in scalding injuries due to hot water heaters.
How has the Junk Science Law been applied to other cases?
Texas' "junk science law," which passed in 2013, presents a pathway for convicted people to obtain new trials if they can show that underlying forensic evidence in their case was flawed and that, without that flawed evidence, they likely wouldn't have been convicted.
But according to a report by The Texas Tribune, convicted people have struggled to win new trials under the law. The report states that, "Of the 74 junk science appeals filed and ruled upon by the Court of Criminal Appeals from September 2013 through December 2023, 15 people won relief, according to the Texas Defender Service, whose analysis did not include four successful and expunged appeals."
The report goes on to say, "While people sentenced to death filed just over a third of those appeals, none were successful. And almost 40% of all appeals were denied on procedural grounds without consideration of the substance of the claims."
The junk science law has made headlines recently because of the case of death row inmate Robert Roberson.
In 2003, Roberson was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of his 2-year-old daughter, who was diagnosed with shaken baby syndrome. He has sought to use the junk science law to vacate his conviction, arguing that new scientific evidence debunked that diagnosis and showed his daughter actually died of undiagnosed pneumonia.
His case has led to a legal back-and-forth. Roberson was scheduled to be executed on Oct. 17, but the House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence subpoenaed him the day before, successfully forcing a delay of his execution. That subpoena prompted an ongoing battle between lawmakers and the Texas Attorney General's Office over securing Roberson's testimony.