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During a recent court hearing, the mother of Tanner Horner-who has pleaded guilty to the murder of 7-year-old Athena Strand-testified as jurors were shown a childhood photo of Horner, taken when he was about the same age as his victim.
Horner’s mother recounted a troubled upbringing filled with abuse and addiction. She revealed that she was sexually assaulted by her stepfather starting at age four, entered rehab by 14, and later worked in strip clubs.
She described a particularly difficult time when she was pregnant while working at a club, during which she struggled with heavy drinking, smoking, and marijuana use. She also shared a harrowing memory of Horner finding her unconscious on the toilet due to heroin use.
“I nodded out one time on the toilet, and I wasn’t doing anything-I had just used, and I just nodded out. Tanner came in; he was just a little guy, and he thought I was dead,” she told the defense attorney.
She admitted, “I’ve never been able to stay sober.” Horner’s mother also spoke about the challenges her son faced, including bullying at school that led him to self-harm.
She said he was diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome and struggled to connect with others. “He wanted to get along with people, but they just weren’t interested in having conversations with him.
It was hard to watch. Very sad.
They didn’t like him at all,” she said.
Horner faces a sentence of life in prison without parole at minimum.
The hearing was emotionally charged, especially when Athena’s mother, Maitlyn Gandy, took the stand. Gandy addressed the court and Horner directly, emphasizing that Athena was much more than a case or headline. Before the trial began last week, Horner had entered a guilty plea to capital murder and aggravated kidnapping, with prosecutors now seeking the death penalty.
Athena was abducted by Horner on November 30, 2022, outside her father’s and stepmother’s home in North Texas. Prosecutors reported that Horner strangled the young girl and left her body near the residence.
He was arrested later that day. According to the arrest affidavit, Horner had been delivering a Barbie set to Athena’s house and claimed to have accidentally hit her with his truck, panicking afterward.
Although he did not actually injure her, he took her into his truck out of fear of her parents’ reaction.
Digital evidence helped law enforcement track Horner that same day. Athena’s body was discovered two days later, about nine miles from the family’s home, southeast of Boyd.
Gandy described her daughter as a vibrant child: “She was the perfect mixture of me and Jacob. She loved to wear her pretty princess dresses, but at the same time, she would play in the dirt in the same pretty princess dresses.
She was free, wild, bright, and loving. She wanted to love and be loved, and that’s it.”
“There is no doubt whatsoever that every single person who has ever met Athena absolutely loved Athena,” Gandy said. “Except the defendant in this case. I would like to think that he doesn’t love her.”