By ABC News
A 19-year-old Kansas City, Missouri, resident was arrested for allegedly burning Tesla vehicles last month, the Justice Department announced on Friday.
Owen McIntire, who is attending college in Boston, was arrested and made his initial court appearance on Friday to face federal charges related to an arson attack at a Tesla dealership in Kansas City on March 17.
The teen, who was home in Kansas City for spring break at the time of the incident, is charged with one count of unlawful possession of an unregistered destructive device and one count of malicious damage by fire of any property used in interstate commerce, federal prosecutors said.
McIntire is the second person arrested this week on federal charges for alleged arson attacks against Tesla dealerships.
“Let me be extremely clear to anyone who still wants to firebomb a Tesla property: you will not evade us,” said Attorney General Pam Bondi. “You will be arrested. You will be prosecuted. You will spend decades behind bars. It is not worth it.”
According to the affidavit, an officer with the Kansas City Police Department “observed smoke coming from a grey Cybertruck parked in the KC Tesla Center parking lot” at approximately 11:16 p.m. on March 17.
Police recovered an unbroken suspected incendiary device — or a Molotov cocktail — on the scene near the burning Cybertruck, the affidavit said.
The fire spread from one Cybertruck to a second, with two charging stations also damaged by the flames, federal prosecutors said.
“This wasn’t vandalism — it was a violent criminal act,” said Dan Driscoll, the acting director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Federal prosecutors said the two Crybertrucks had sale prices of $105,485 and $107,485, and the two charging stations were individually valued at $550.
“This arrest continued to reinforce a clear message from the FBI: We are committed to ensuring the safety and security of our community from violent actors,” FBI Kansas City Special Agent in Charge Stephen Cyrus said in a statement.
It is not immediately clear whether McIntire entered a plea to the charges and his attorney’s information was not available as of Friday afternoon.
Another suspect, Jamison Wagner of New Mexico, faces federal charges in connection with two separate arson attacks on a Tesla dealership and the Republican Party’s state headquarters in Albuquerque, according to court documents unsealed this week. Wagner has not yet entered a plea.
Tesla vehicles, dealerships and charging stations have been vandalized, suffered arson and faced protests in several cities across the country in recent months since the company’s CEO Elon Musk began his work at the White House spearheading the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE.
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