A former FedEx delivery driver who pleaded guilty to killing a 7-year-old girl in Texas was sentenced to death Tuesday.
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The jury handed down the death penalty for Tanner Horner after a court proceeding that lasted more than two weeks.
Horner, 34, was set to go on trial when he pleaded guilty April 7 in the kidnapping and killing of Athena Strand in rural Wise County in November 2022.
“There are no words that truly capture the devastation that Tanner Horner caused us and our family,” Athena’s uncle, Elijah Strand, said in court after the death sentence was read.
“It was the best thing to see her running up to me with her arms open, yelling ‘Uncle Elijah,’ and it’s one of my last memories I have of her,” Strand said. “And now I get to never hear that again.”
Horner stood but showed no outward emotion as Judge George Gallagher sentenced him to be executed before sunrise on a date later to be determined in Huntsville.
Texas uses lethal injection to carry out executions.
Horner had delivered a Christmas present to the family’s home in the rural town of Paradise on Nov. 30, 2022, the day Athena went missing. Her body was found two days later, according to officials.
Horner has said he struck the girl with his van and strangled her in a panic. Wise County District Attorney James Stainton said Horner killed the girl and called his explanations lies.
Stainton told the jury in closing arguments that the death penalty should only be used in the most extreme cases but that Horner deserved it.
“Tanner Horner is proof why parents hug their children a little tighter,” he said. “He’s proof of why children are nervous to go play outside.”
Horner pleaded guilty last month to capital murder of a person under the age of 10 and aggravated kidnapping.
The jury had a choice of sentencing Horner to death or life in prison without parole. The panel on Tuesday found two special issues that allow the death penalty.
First, that there was a probability Horner would commit acts of violence posing a “continuing threat to society”; and second, they rejected that there were mitigating factors justifying a sentence of life in prison without parole.
An appeal was automatically filed on Horner’s behalf, and a lawyer will be appointed in that appeal, Gallagher said.
Horner’s defense argued for mitigation, saying that Horner’s mother drank heavily while pregnant and he was diagnosed with fetal alcohol syndrome disorder, which causes emotional and cognitive issues and other problems.
“Tanner’s problems began before he was even born,” defense attorney Susan Anderson said in closing arguments. She asked for the jury to be merciful.
Elijah Strand said the girl’s murder left the family “an emptiness that can never be filled.”
“Athena was more than a headline. She was laughter, curiosity, kindness and innocence,” her uncle said. “And she had dreams that she will never get to chase, birthdays that she will never celebrate and a life she’ll never get to live, because of his actions.”
Horner, seated at his defense table, looked at Strand as he spoke and at times looked down.
“I want you to know,” Strand said, looking at Horner, “that you are nothing. You are a footnote in Athena’s story. Her name will forever be remembered, her name will forever be celebrated, and everyone will forget you.”
The crime was committed in Wise County, but the trial was moved to Fort Worth to ensure that Horner received a fair trial.