The grieving mother of a young girl who was kidnapped and murdered by a FedEx driver was seen staring down the killer as she delivered heartbreaking testimony.

Maitlyn Gandy, the mother of seven-year-old Athena Strand, took the stand on Wednesday at 34-year-old Tanner Horner’s sentencing hearing, wearing a pink suit and dyeing her hair pink to match her late daughter’s favorite color.

When she was asked why she makes a point to attend every hearing leading up to Horner’s sentencing, Gandy said it is because she had to ‘cover up handprint bruises around my daughter’s neck and because she no longer has a voice.

‘And I want people to know that she’s not just some story, she’s not just some number. She’s not just some picture you see in a headline. She was loved. She is loved,’ Gandy told the jurors tasked with deciding whether Horner should face the death penalty.

‘And she is missed. And she was real. And she had a life and she wanted to live. And no one can take that from her,’ the still-grieving mother continued, turning her attention directly to Horner. ‘Not a single person can take that from her.

‘And I will be her face and I will be her voice and I will make sure that every person in this world knows that she was loved and that she wanted to live, and we want her in our lives.’

Horner had been delivering a box of Barbie dolls that were due to be the young girl’s Christmas present to her home in Paradise, Texas in November 2022 when he saw Strand playing outside unattended.

He then strangled the youngster, abducted her and dumped her body in a creek.

Horner has since pleaded guilty to capital murder and aggravated kidnapping.

But he has claimed he accidentally struck Strand with his truck and that he strangled her out of fear she would tell her parents.

He told the court he initially tried to break Athena’s neck to kill her, but that it didn’t work, so he strangled her with his bare hands instead.

The young girl was remembered by her mother on Wednesday as ‘free,’ ‘wild,’ ‘independent’ and ‘strong.’

‘She was bright and she was loving,’ Gandy said. ‘She wanted to be loved and to give love and that’s it… Athena loved everything. She loved life.’

When Gandy first learned her daughter was missing, she said she was in disbelief, and she made the drive from her home in Oklahoma to Strand’s father’s house in Texas in just about 45 minutes – a trip she said that normally takes two hours.

‘I just told myself that if I kept going, it would be OK and I would find her,’ Gandy testified, only to find that she was not allowed to join in the search efforts for two days as police feared she could throw search dogs off the scent.

When Gandy was later told that her daughter was found dead, she said she ‘went into a place of denial.

‘I stopped breathing and I started to black out,’ she recounted.

She was finally able to see her daughter on December 6, 2022, when she said she noticed her daughter’s ‘ears were messed up and she had incision lines and her chin was scraped up.

‘…And I searched her body looking for any reason,’ Gandy continued. ‘But that wasn’t my baby. And then we did her makeup so Jacob wouldn’t have to see the discoloration and how bad it was,’ she said of Strand’s father.

From there, Gandy said she went to pick out a dress that was pretty enough for her daughter.

‘She was so cold and she didn’t like the cold, so I wanted to make sure that she was dressed,’ the heartbroken mother continued. ‘So I picked out clothes. I picked out socks and panties and shoes and leggings and dresses, and I wanted to make sure she had one of her bows. So I got her some bows.’

Gandy also spoke about her younger daughter, Ry, who was four years and seven months younger than Athena.

She said Athena was ‘beaming’ when she got to hold Ry in her arms for the first time.

‘She’d been asking me for a sibling for a year or more and she finally got her,’ Gandy recounted.

She then received Athena’s ashes on December 10, 2022 – Ry’s third birthday.

‘I brought her sister home. It just wasn’t the way I was supposed to,’ Gandy said.

‘I didn’t know how to tell her and I didn’t think I was strong enough to tell her, so I lied to her for a long time. I would tell her that she was just staying with her daddy for a little bit longer and when she asked to FaceTime or to call her, I would tell her that she was at school or she was sleeping,’ she continued.

‘I would lie to her until about a year ago. She didn’t know the whole truth. I didn’t tell her that she had been killed until what should have been Athena’s eighth birthday.’

The mother concluded by saying she talks to her daughter every day and apologizes for not being there to protect her and to stop Horner.

‘I tell her that I love her,’ she said. ‘I talk to her about Ry and what she’s doing in life and how much she loves and misses her.’

She also tells her daughter about the people who love her and about the attorneys who are working to make sure she’s not forgotten.

Jurors had previously heard how in January 2023, Horner sent Strand’s heartbroken family a remorseful letter saying he does not ‘do well with changes or things that are unpredictable’ due to his Asperger’s Syndrome – an autism spectrum disorder whose sufferers may struggle to cope if their usual daily routine is disrupted.

Horner said in the letter he was extremely stressed by not being able to drive the exact same route in his FedEx truck every day, which he blamed for committing the murder.

At the trial on Monday, jurors were also shown letters Horner wrote to Strand’s family

‘I’m sorry I allowed my mental state to be unstable. I’m sorry I took your little angel away from you. She didn’t deserve it. My son didn’t deserve to lose his father,’ he wrote, as he moaned about the impact his crime would have on his own family.

‘My mother didn’t deserve to lose her son. My fiancé didn’t deserve to have her wedding day stripped away from her. I pray my death eases your suffering,’ he concluded.

The sentencing hearing is now scheduled to continue on Thursday, when jurors are expected to watch footage from inside Horner’s vehicle on the day Strand was kidnapped.