Tanner Horner capital murder trial enters 4th week; killer’s pastor testifies
Jurors heard from Tanner Horner’s former pastor and a speech-language pathologist who recently evaluated the defendant in jail as defense attorneys continued to press their case at Horner’s capital murder trial Monday in Tarrant County.
The trial entered its fourth week Monday. Horner has already pleaded guilty to kidnapping and killing 7-year-old Athena Strand after delivering a package to her family’s Wise County home on Nov. 30, 2022. His attorneys are trying to convince the jury that the 34-year-old defendant should receive life in prison without the possibility of parole instead of the death penalty.
Gary, the pastor who was identified in court only by his first name, said Horner was in junior high when he began attending the church with his grandparents. He testified that the church leaders were aware of Horner’s autism diagnosis, and they tried to help and support him as much as they could.
Horner auditioned and earned a spot on the youth group’s fine arts team.
“I think that gave him a sense of belonging,” Gary said.
According to the pastor, Horner stopped attending services regularly when he started to drive on his own. His last contact with Horner was after Athena’s death. Gary said he got a call that Horner wanted to see him at the jail.
Gary told the jury that he didn’t discuss the specifics of the murder with the defendant. He just wanted to pray with Horner and make sure he understood the seriousness of the crime.
“My goal was just ‘Tanner, do you understand the severity? Do you get what happened and that this is going to be life changing, and you can’t undo that?’” Gary said.
Dr. Amy Fritz, a speech-language pathologist, was the last witness of the day. She evaluated Horner at the Tarrant County Jail in January 2026. Fritz said she reviewed Horner’s educational records and his social history, including his family life. She also looked over his medical records and interviewed his grandmother.
Horner was diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, now known as autism spectrum disorder or level one autism, as a child. Fritz said her findings were consistent with that. She met with Horner over a period of two days to assess his communication and social language skills.
According to Fritz, Horner’s vocabulary and cognitive abilities are within normal limits, but he has profound deficits in social communication skills. He also struggles to understand nuances in language.
Fritz testified that Horner has alexithymia, which is a difficulty processing his own emotions and understanding the emotions of others. In spite of that, she noted that he does have the ability to show empathy and remorse.
According to Fritz, the best example of that was his letter to Athena’s family shortly before he attempted suicide at the jail in May 2023. Horner apologized to the family and wrote he’d “done a terrible thing.” The defendant went on to blame his autism and recent problems he’d been experiencing at work and home for what he did to Athena.
Fritz said the letter met all of the criteria for empathy, but prosecutor Michelle Duell pointed out that Horner appeared to be shifting blame for his actions and didn’t tell Athena’s family the truth about what happened to their daughter. Fritz replied that the language of the letter showed empathy and remorse.
According to Fritz, Horner told her there was no backup camera on his FedEx truck and he’d hit Athena while leaving her house. He said he freaked out because he didn’t know what to do. Horner initially told the same story to investigators immediately after Athena’s murder.
Fritz said it was hard to see Horner as remorseful at that moment because she knew he was lying to her face. She didn’t challenge him on the lie because she “needed to see the accuracies or inaccuracies in his story. And so I didn’t want to shut him down,” she said.
Fritz also reviewed clips of the abduction video that shows Horner placing Athena in his FedEx truck. The defendant covered the camera, but chilling audio evidence recounts the 7-year-old’s last moments. She died from blunt force trauma, smothering and strangulation, and Horner dumped her naked body in the water along the Trinity River.
The witness said she received the video three days ago and was surprised by what she saw.
“I was most surprised by the violence,” Fritz told the jurors. “I think the violence of it was really incongruent with the gentleman I met, with the reports that I read hours about. It was shocking, it was horrific. It’s awful, and I’m so sorry.”
Fritz said she was also surprised that Horner didn’t seem to show the emotional dysregulation she would have expected under the circumstances.
“I don’t see the red face,” Fritz said. “I didn’t see head banging, you know. Some of those sort of stereotypical indications of an autism meltdown were not there.”
Fritz affirmed Horner is capable of knowing right from wrong.
Defense attorney Susan Anderson asked Fritz about Horner blaming his “alter ego” Zero for Athena’s death, and the possibility of a multiple personality disorder.
Fritz said she’s not an expert in multiple personality disorders, but “it was pretty obvious to me that Zero does not exist and Mr. Horner was using him as a tool to explain what had happened.”
Jurors heard from one of Horner’s childhood friends Monday morning and a special educator who worked with Horner during his high school years at Azle ISD. The trial is scheduled to resume Tuesday and is expected to continue into next week.
This story was originally published April 27, 2026 at 11:13 PM.
