in 2003 after preceding Miss Florida Ericka Dunlap
won Miss America
. She had previously won Miss St. Petersburg. She was born in 1979.
Pender graduated from Houston County High School near Warner Robins, Georgia
.
In 2003, Pender graduated Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Arts degree in theatre from Florida State University
.
Pender appeared on several network program broadcasts as an actress and in numerous media reports on her accident and recovery.
I go through life thinking it's all going to end tomorrow.
I don't believe in self-promotion, really I can't be arsed.
I always wanted to be an actor. I had the arrogance to believe I couldn't be anything else.
As far as I'm concerned, I want to be nowhere else. It's difficult in film because everybody wants to make a safe bet with roles. But if you are going to do stuff then you should be getting strong reactions. I don't want audiences to be going, "Yeah, that's all right."
It's something else. I'm speechless. I've just got to step up to the plate and deal with it. I had a confidence about it but then that's because of the people around me who made me feel good about it. I knew positively on Monday. I was in Baltimore when I took the call. My first reaction was I needed a drink.
I hate handguns. Handguns are used to shoot people and as long as they are around, people will shoot each other. That's a simple fact. I've seen a bullet wound and it was a mess. It was on a shoot and it scared me. Bullets have a nasty habit of finding their target and that's what's scary about them.
If I went onto the Internet and started looking at what some people were saying about me - which, sadly, I have done - it would drive me insane.