Kansas City woman who set fire to planned ICE warehouse pleads to felony charge

Nathan Pilling, The Kansas City Star on May 7, 2026

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A Kansas City woman who admitted to setting fire to a warehouse that federal officials had considered as an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center pleaded to a felony charge in federal court Thursday.

Dara S. O’Connor, 30, pleaded guilty to one count of knowingly possessing unregistered destructive devices in U.S. District Court in Kansas City. As part of a plea agreement, O’Connor agreed to pay around $43,000 in restitution.

O’Connor is scheduled to be sentenced Sept. 10. According to court documents, prosecutors and O’Connor’s attorneys agreed to recommend a prison sentence of between two and five years.

O’Connor’s attorneys did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday evening.

Authorities said O’Connor approached the building around 5:45 p.m. on Feb. 12, threw two Molotov cocktails at it and used liquid accelerant to spread the fire. The fire went out after a few minutes, according to court documents.

Prosecutors said Platform Ventures, the company that owned the building at 14901 Botts Road, had a loss of around $43,000, which covered “building repair, building cleaning and additional security for the warehouse and certain senior executives of the company.”