Tanner Horner: FedEx driver who killed Athena Strand faces 3 new child sex assault charges from 2013
WISE COUNTY, TEXAS: A new child sexual abuse charge has been filed against Texas FedEx driver Tanner Horner, who is suspected of killing seven-year-old Athena Strand by strangulation on Dec. 20 and dumping her body in a nearby river. According to Wise County Sheriff Lane Akin, the three child abuse charges have nothing to do with Athena's horrific murder last month.
On charges of capital murder and aggravated kidnapping in connection with Athena's death, Horner was already incarcerated in the Wise County jail. After accidentally hitting the girl with his van, he allegedly admitted to strangling her. Sexual assault charges were filed against him in Tarrant County, about 35 miles from where Horner, 31, abducted Athena from her Paradise home. According to the police report, Horner claimed he accidentally hit Athena with his van but did not realize it until after the fact because he was afraid she would inform her parents. According to a New York Post report, he allegedly panicked and threw the girl into the back of the FedEx truck while delivering a package that was supposed to be her Christmas present.
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According to the warrant, Horner attempted to break Athena's neck before strangling her with his own hands, although he claimed she was not seriously injured. About 10 miles from her home, he dumped her body into the Trinity River. Later, the stepmother tried to find Athena but claimed to police that she had not known the girl had left, perhaps to her improvised bedroom because she had been in it. Horner had just made a delivery to the house when he saw Athena in the driveway. Horner told officers that at that moment he tried to break the young girl's neck. When he failed to do so, according to the affidavit, he claimed he strangled Athena in the back seat of the car with his bare hands
After Horner's arrest, a woman came forward and repeated earlier allegations that Horner sexually assaulted her when she was a minor. In 2019, Shay Marie wrote on her Facebook page about the alleged assault, naming Tanner Horner as the alleged perpetrator who raped her when she was 16 and Horner was 23. "December 6th and 7th marks 7 years since you violated me and treated me like you were entitled to my body. 7 years. i was a child in a vulnerable state and you took advantage of that," Marie wrote.