Psychiatrist’s testimony reveals new details of Tanner Horner’s crime
A forensic psychiatrist who evaluated Tanner Horner told jurors Wednesday that Horner admitted to sexually assaulting Athena Strand before killing the 7-year-old in the back of his FedEx truck in November 2022.
Dr. Eileen Ryan testified for the defense Tuesday and Wednesday at Horner’s capital murder trial in Tarrant County. She reviewed the defendant’s records and met with him over a period of four days at the Tarrant County Jail. Ryan said Horner meets the criteria for multiple conditions, including autism spectrum disorder, major depression, ADHD and fetal alcohol spectrum disorder.
Horner has already pleaded guilty to kidnapping and killing Athena 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.
None of Horner’s conditions caused him to kill Athena or kept him from knowing the difference between right and wrong, according to Ryan. The jury might consider the disorders mitigating evidence, however, because “they certainly impact how Mr. Horner developed, moved through the world, how he came to be the person that he is,” she said.
Horner falsely told investigators and others that he backed into Athena with his FedEx truck and then freaked out because he didn’t know what to do. He kidnapped her and killed her in a panic, he said. On April 16, the jury heard chilling audio and video evidence that Horner lured Athena into his truck and then initiated a string of lies to conceal what he’d done to the 7-year-old.
Prosecutors have said that Horner planned to kidnap and kill Athena. They point to video evidence showing that Horner covered a camera lens in the truck at least three times that week, including before a Nov. 29 delivery to a family with two young daughters who lived on the same county road as Athena.
Ryan said she believes Horner never intended to kill Athena at the beginning. The defendant told her that he put the child in the back of his truck because “she saw him snorting cocaine,” the psychiatrist testified.
“He immediately jumped to the conclusion that Athena saw him snorting cocaine and so she was going to tell and he was going to lose his job, which meant he was not going to be able to support his son,” Ryan said.
Ryan told the jury that she believes Horner’s account, and that it’s consistent with his diagnoses and the related tendency to “catastrophize” situations. In her opinion, Horner realized he’d made the situation worse after he put Athena in the truck and she asked if he was a kidnapper. That’s when he decided to kill her, Ryan said.
According to Ryan, Horner initially denied that he’d sexually assaulted Athena. Ryan said she knew he was lying because she’d already seen a transcript of the audio recording from the FedEx van. Horner can be heard saying “Don’t scream or I’ll hurt you,” to Athena, and then later tells her to take off her shirt and other clothes.
Ryan said when Horner finally told her about the assault, he spoke haltingly and “his eyes were downcast.”
“My opinion was that he was deeply ashamed, and that was a major factor in his lying,” Ryan said. She added that the defendant “appeared to be quite remorseful about what he had done.”
This appears to be the first time that Horner had confessed to sexually assaulting the 7-year-old. A DNA analyst testified April 15 that Horner could not be excluded as a contributor of the male DNA found on swabs in the victim’s sexual assault kit.
Ryan said that Horner also told her that he was sexually assaulted by a neighbor as a child.
According to Ryan, Horner admitted that he punched and kicked Athena in the head after his attempts to break her neck and strangle the 7-year-old didn’t work. Prosecuting attorneys indicated earlier that there were tread marks from Horner’s shoes on Athena’s face, but prosecutor James Stainton noted Wednesday that this was the first time Horner had confessed to those details of the crime. Stainton also questioned why the psychiatrist made notes of those details but did not include them in her formal written report.
Medical examiner records show Athena died from blunt force trauma, smothering and strangulation. Horner dumped her naked body in the water along the Trinity River and then borrowed supplies from Love’s Travel Stop to clean up the truck before taking it back to the FedEx station.
Stainton challenged the psychiatrist on many of her findings and repeatedly asked why Ryan believes Horner’s story about the cocaine when the defendant lied about other things.
Ryan acknowledged that she doesn’t have proof of what Horner said about the drugs, but it’s her opinion that it was true. She said that Horner told her he covered up a video camera lens in the FedEx truck because he used cocaine in the vehicle on the day he murdered Athena. Prosecutors have said that Horner covered the truck’s front-facing camera about an hour before he arrived at Athena’s house but that he did not cover the camera that showed the inside of the truck until moments after he abducted the child.
Ryan testified that Horner struggles with problem solving due to his various conditions, but Stainton pointed out that he was able to dispose of Athena’s body without any difficulty and figured out a story to tell his FedEx boss to ensure he’d be given the same vehicle the following day.
“You understand that he’s doing these things, these problem-solving type actions, within 10 minutes of him tossing her body in the water?” Stainton asked, and Ryan agreed.
The psychiatrist testified that despite Horner’s admission and audio-recording evidence that he sexually assaulted Athena and allegations that he raped two 16-year-old girls, her opinion is that doesn’t show the pattern required for a diagnosis of pedophilia.
In response to questions from the defense, Ryan said she believes Horner would present a low risk of future violence while in prison.
Future dangerousness is a key question in death penalty cases in Texas, according to state law. In their deliberations, the jury will first answer that question. If the jurors find that Horner represents a continuing threat to society, they will then consider whether there is mitigating evidence that would justify a sentence of life in prison instead of death. Mitigating evidence is open to interpretation in the minds of the jurors, but it could include issues such as the defendant’s mental health.
Jurors also heard from a fetal alcohol expert Wednesday who said scans of Horner’s brain showed abnormalities consistent with fetal alcohol issues.
Horner’s grandmother is scheduled to take the witness stand Thursday.
