Former FedEx driver sentenced to death for killing 7-year-old girl after delivery at her Texas home

AP ^ | May 5, 2026 | : JAMIE STENGLE

[PROCON]

ALLAS (AP) — A former FedEx driver was sentenced to death on Tuesday after he pleaded guilty to killing a 7-year-old girl he took from her Texas home while delivering a Christmas gift.

Jurors in a Fort Worth courtroom decided on Tanner Horner’s punishment after hearing about a month of testimony and evidence that included audio of Athena Strand’s last moments from inside his delivery van. Horner, 34, pleaded guilty to capital murder last month in the 2022 killing just as his trial began. Athena’s body was found two days after she was reported missing from her home in the rural town of Paradise, near Fort Worth.

[PROCON]

I hope this murdering scumbag gets prison vengeance.

[V_TWIN]

[Carl Vehse]

Among the methods of executions in Texas should be included death by wood chipper. In voting for that, the vote should also establish legally that it is not to be recognized as a cruel or unusual punishment.

[xp38]

Yeah because he won’t be executed for decades the way things typically go. Maybe Texas could speed things up a bit though.

[Midwesterner53]

Better yet, get a group of Dads with young daughters, give this dude about a minute head start and turn the Dads loose with howling hunting dogs and let them carry out the sentence with a necktie party at the end.

[House Atreides]

“I hope this murdering scumbag gets prison vengeance.”
*********************************************

I’m sure he will if he gets anywhere near ‘general population’ in prison. He’s a monster who doesn’t deserve to live for decades while waiting for execution.

[SkyDancer]

Let’s hope he gets swift justice instead of waiting around for twenty years like most do.

[SkyDancer]

And if it’s as heinous as this murderer you go to the head of the line.

[Flaming Conservative]

👍

[ConservativeMind]

I like the wood chipper option.

[Ge0ffrey]

Why is the AP prosecutung FedEx? What does FedEx have to do with it?

[SkyDancer]

Probably put in solitary for his own protection.

[Albion Wilde]

This is the photo from inside the FedEx truck while he was kidnapping her and she was begging for her mother and to go home. Jury also heard a recording of that:

[Albion Wilde]

He had come there to deliver her Christmas present — a Barbie.

[dfwgator]

So he’ll be executed around 2050.

[Sirius Lee]

Let’s hope he gets swift justice instead of waiting around for twenty years like most do.

Let's hope that the method of execution is being slowly lowered into an industrial shredder feet first.

[hanamizu]

I hope this murdering scumbag gets prison vengeance.

---

I hope he does everyone, the victim’s family, the state prison system, the state’s taxpayers, and a future cellmate a favor and spare anyone the trouble of doing him in.

[NorthMountain]

He was working as a ShredEx driver when he committed the crime.

[Semper Vigilantis]

Ron White (proud Texan):
Other state's are trying to abolish the death penalty... mine's putting in an express lane.

[DarrellZero]

He won’t because of death row.

If they gave him life and sent him to general population, his life expectancy would be about 6 months.

Other inmates hate chomos.