What happened to Athena Strand? Tanner Horner sentenced to death

A former FedEx driver pleaded guilty to kidnapping and killing a 7-year-old girl after delivering what would have been her Christmas gift, but the prosecution and defense told conflicting stories about what led to the tragic killing.

Tanner Lynn Horner pleaded guilty to the 2022 murder of Athena Strand at the start of his trial and was sentenced to death on May 5. Prosecuting attorney James Stainton said Horner planned to abduct, sexually assault and kill Athena then tried to hide his crimes by covering the camera in his FedEx truck and repeatedly lying to police.

“That’s not the look of someone who doesn’t have a plan, who doesn’t have motivation, that hasn’t thought this out, that hasn’t fantasized about this,” Stainton said May 5. “That’s the look of a predator right there.”

Meanwhile, Horner’s defense attorney argued that Horner killed Athena because she caught him using cocaine in his truck and the situation “snowballed” from there. Susan Anderson told jurors in her closing argument that Horner’s fetal alcohol syndrome, lead exposure and autism diagnoses don’t justify the killing, but partially explain what led to it.

“And it’s natural for us to want to know why this happened. But you know what? We won’t ever know why it happened,” Anderson told jurors in her closing argument.

Here’s what to know about the tragic case:

What did Tanner Horner do? What happened to Athena Strand?

Stainton said Horner delivered a package containing Barbies to Athena’s home in Paradise, a town of fewer than 500 people about 60 miles outside Dallas, on Nov. 30, 2022. Stainton said Horner then kidnapped Athena and attacked her for more than an hour. He showed the jury a pair of muddy shoes he said Horner used to “beat the life out of her.”

“And I think that is key to this entire case. If the facts were not bad enough, if the sexual assault wasn’t bad enough, the level of violence that one person can inflict on a child, including stomping them with a pair of shoes,” he said.

Texas Ranger Job Espinoza testified that cameras captured Horner stuffing Athena’s clothes into a backpack, which was later found at his home, and cleaning the FedEx van after the attack.

Horner told someone over the phone that he cleaned the truck because he threw up in it, according to video footage. Horner also returned to the scene, where a woman told him the area was blocked off because of the kidnapping.

“Are you serious?” he said in video shown to the jury.

After he was caught, Horner spun a “web of lies” and told multiple different stories about what happened to Athena and where her body was during the police investigation, Stainton said.

At one point, Horner told investigators that he took Athena after he accidentally hit her with his vehicle, so that she wouldn’t report him. He said she wasn’t seriously injured but he panicked and strangled her after she said she would tell her father he hit her. He also concocted an alter ego named “Zero,” who he said was responsible for the killing.

Athena was found naked in the Trinity River near an area called Bobo’s Crossing, about 12 to 13 miles away from her home, Stainton and former Wise County Sheriff Lane Akin, a witness in the trial, said. Medical examiner Jennifer Dwyer testified that she died of blunt force injuries with smothering and strangulation.

Tanner Horner audio recording played for the jury

Horner was caught on the camera installed in his FedEx delivery vehicle approaching Athena’s house. He returned minutes later with the 7-year-old in tow, whom he picked up and placed in his truck. Horner covered the lens of the truck’s internal camera after the initial kidnapping, which only captured audio from that point forward.

Athena’s first questions to Horner, were “What are you doing?” and “Are you a kidnapper?” according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, NBC DFW and Fox 4. At one point, he told the girl, “You’re really pretty. You know that?”

He could be heard on the recording telling the girl, who had begun to cry, to remove her shirt and threatening to hurt her if she screamed. Athena repeatedly told Horner no and asked to go home to her mother. Later, “Jingle Bell Rock” played from the radio as Horner told the screaming Athena to “shut up” or he would hurt her more, reported the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

The audio recording captured the sounds of the ensuing attack, including banging, screaming, crying and choking. Jurors reached for piles of tissues and audibly sniffled in the silence that fell between the audio playback, local outlets reported.

Contributing: Jeanine Santucci