TWO WORDS… THAT CHANGED EVERYTHING. According to investigators, one response stood out during the encounter. A short answer… delivered without emotion. Sources say it came after repeated questions from Athena Strand. Authorities believe that was the moment she understood the situation. From that point on, everything shifted. Many are now questioning what led to that moment… 📌 Full story

SHE TRIED TO ESCAPE INSIDE THE TRUCK

Moments after Tanner Horner picked up Athena Strand and placed the 7-year-old in his FedEx truck, the confused little girl wanted to know what was going on.

“Are you a kidnapper?” she could be heard asking him in video footage from inside the truck that was shown to jurors in Horner’s sentencing trial.

As PEOPLE previously reported, on Tuesday, April 7, Tanner Horner, 34, pleaded guilty to capital murder and aggravated kidnapping in the Nov. 30, 2022 death of the first-grader.

Now jurors are weighing whether to sentence him to life in prison without parole or to death.

Jurors learned from prosecutors and the video that after luring Athena to his truck and kidnapping her from the driveway of her Paradise, Texas, home, he set her down in the cargo area of the truck behind the passenger seat and told her to stay there.

The video, however, shows Athena standing up and holding onto the door frame between the driver’s seat and the cargo area while she continues to ask him questions.

When she asked him where they were going, he replied, “It doesn’t matter,” NBC DFW and the Star-Telegram report.

Athena Strand inside Tanner Horner’s FedEx truck on Nov. 30, 2022.