Tanner Horner, convicted of the heinous crime of killing a child, is set to spend the remainder of his life on death row at one of Texas’s most notorious prisons. A jury this week sentenced him to death, ensuring his future in one of the state’s most severe penal facilities.
Horner will be incarcerated at the Polunsky Unit, a prison located outside Houston known for its harsh conditions. This facility houses death row inmates in solitary confinement, where they endure at least 22 hours a day in their small, 60-square-foot cells.
The 34-year-old, who previously worked as a FedEx delivery driver, was transferred to this infamous prison shortly after receiving his sentence. He was convicted of the brutal murder of 7-year-old Athena Strand, whom he confessed to strangling while delivering a Christmas package to her home in November 2022.
Horner will remain at Polunsky Unit until his execution by lethal injection, a process that could take years, if not decades, depending on how vigorously he pursues appeals.
Under Texas law, his case automatically enters the appeals process following the sentencing, affording him at least a temporary reprieve in his stark new environment.
Should Horner decide to continue fighting his sentence, he may have the potential to extend his time on death row for many years, contingent upon the legal grounds he can establish for an appeal.
The Polunsky Unit has death row inmates who have been sitting there for nearly 50 years, with the longest awaiting their execution since being condemned in 1977.
Most are killed far quicker, however, with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice listing the average stay on death row at just over 11 years.
The shortest stay was under a year, with an inmate serving just 252 days before being put to death in 1996.
Exactly how hard Horner intends to appeal his case is unclear — but he admitted to killing little Athena on the first day of his trial, with disturbing footage of him kidnapping the girl before singing Christmas carols while he murdered her, prompting a jury to send him to death row.
Horner’s cell will be furnished with nothing more than a metal bunk and thin mattress, a metal desk and a metal toilet and sink just feet from the bed.
He’ll spend nearly the entire day in there — he’ll eat his meals in the cell, and he’ll have access to no entertainment beyond reading materials and a pen and paper to write with.
Horner will also be subjected to constant surveillance, with hourly checks that continue through the night that will prevent him from getting continuous sleep, NBC 5 reported.
And he’ll only be let out for an hour of exercise per day — but even then will be kept in a small cage intended to prevent him from having any contact with his fellow inmates.
Any other time spent outside of his cell will be for brief showers or time with visitors.
Visitations are also designed to keep prisoners isolated — Horner will never be able to see somebody from the outside world without a pain of glass between them.
Conditions at the Polunsky Unit are so severe that advocacy groups like SolitaryWatch have called the prison “inhumane,” while family members of those incarcerated have called the unit “a form torture.”
A group of inmates called the prison’s solitary confinement policy a “psychologically and physically damaging practice” in a 2023 lawsuit which alleged their constitutional rights had been violated by the conditions.
Texas’ notoriously strict death row system was imposed in 1999 after seven inmates escaped from another prison — with the consolidation of all condemned inmates on the Polunsky Unit intended to keep them from congregating as a group and to prevent similar dangerous prison breaks.
The Lonestar State has the highest number of executions in the entire United States.
Horner’s inmates for the rest of his days will be like him — the worst of the worst, who committed especially heinous murders of children and other, oftentimes, helpless individuals.
