O.C. Bookkeeper Set Afire, Dies; Janitor Arrested

A janitor who apparently was agitated over the late payment of a $150 check doused a bookkeeper with a flammable liquid Tuesday, then calmly walked away as flames engulfed her, police said.

The bookkeeper, Karen LaBorde, 42, of Orange, died shortly before 5 p.m. at UCI Medical Center, about nine hours after sustaining burns over 95% of her body, police said.

Jonathan Daniel D’Arcy, 30, of La Habra was arrested minutes after the attack in a parking lot next to the offices of Quintessence of Building Maintenance Co., a firm that occasionally employed him as a contract janitor to clean offices.

D’Arcy was being held at Orange County Jail in Santa Ana on suspicion of murder. His bail was set at $250,000.

D’Arcy, who has a criminal record for burglary and a history of domestic violence, had a problem with Quintessence over “a check that had not been paid,” Tustin police said.

The incident horrified workers at Quintessence, which reportedly sends up to 60 janitors a day to jobs around the county.

Lisa Stone, a receptionist, said D’Arcy approached her desk on the second floor of the company’s Spanish-style office building on Irvine Boulevard at about 8:30 a.m., saying, “I want to see Kari (LaBorde). I want to see her now.”

Stone said she went to the bookkeeper’s office and asked LaBorde if she wanted to see D’Arcy. “She waved like, ‘I don’t want to see him,’ ” Stone said.

Carrying a paper cup full of bluish-green liquid, D’Arcy pushed past Stone and went into LaBorde’s office, yelling, “I want my (expletive) money!” Stone said. He then threw the contents of the cup at LaBorde’s head, Stone said.

The receptionist said she did not see what ignited the liquid, but suddenly flames shot through the room and she saw D’Arcy fleeing.

Detectives speculated that D’Arcy ignited the liquid with a lighter, Tustin Police Lt. Chuck Crane said.

Witnesses said co-workers fled the building as flames spread through LaBorde’s office.

An auto detailer working in a nearby parking lot said he heard “screaming that someone had lit the place on fire.”

The detailer, Craig McKinnon, 27, said he and his brother sprinted upstairs with a fire extinguisher, passing a man matching D’Arcy’s description who was walking down the stairs.

The man was silent, McKinnon recalled, “just walking like nothing” had happened.

McKinnon said flames were up to the ceiling of LaBorde’s office as he rushed inside, firing the extinguisher. He said he hit the floor to avoid breathing the billowing smoke, blindly emptying the extinguisher. Then he heard “someone start moaning” as the smoke cleared, he said.

McKinnon was later treated at Western Medical Center-Santa Ana for a cut knee and smoke inhalation, and released.

Quintessence salesman Robert Widaseck described LaBorde, the mother of two teen-agers, as an “innocent bystander” in D’Arcy’s disagreement with Quintessence over the $150 paycheck.

A friend described LaBorde as a popular woman and a church-goer who was the sole source of income for her family.

Shirley Bradley, 26, who lived next door to LaBorde in a Yorba Linda condominium complex until late last year, said LaBorde’s husband, Jerry, had recently lost his job as a computer consultant.

“She is very well-liked,” Bradley said. “She would work long hours, and when she wasn’t working she was with her family.”

Police said LaBorde did nothing to provoke the attack. “It was all purely his anger at the business, and he took it out on her,” Tustin Police Sgt. Mark Bergquist said.

Widaseck said co-workers knew that D’Arcy had a short fuse.

“He’d lose his temper rather quickly,” said Widaseck, who described D’Arcy as a “rather high-strung” but “great” worker.

Widaseck said he believes that Quintessence had prepared D’Arcy’s check and that it was ready for him in LaBorde’s office. It was “probably burned” in the fire, he said.

Court records on file in the Orange County Courthouse portray a man who was deeply troubled. In April, 1981, D’Arcy pleaded guilty to a felony burglary charge in Superior Court in Santa Ana and was sentenced to 18 months in state prison.

Additionally, D’Arcy was charged with breaking into a Buena Park home in February, 1981, and stealing household items. D’Arcy told investigators that he broke into the house because the woman resident had been saying bad things about him in the neighborhood.

“I’m not a criminal; I’m a nice guy. I have no reason to steal because I had money,” D’Arcy told investigators then, according to court documents. He requested that a therapist hypnotize him because he felt “that something must be basically wrong.”

As a youth, D’Arcy was placed in classes for the “emotionally handicapped.” According to court records, he committed several burglaries as a juvenile, including one in which he stole stereo equipment from a church. He was placed in juvenile detention repeatedly.

A 1977 Juvenile Court psychological evaluation found D’Arcy suffered from a “deviation in social development.”

Court records also show that a La Habra woman filed three restraining orders against D’Arcy between 1987 and 1989, alleging that he had threatened her and her children.

The restraining orders allege that D’Arcy was living with Joan Leslie Willis when he assaulted her, chased her children, made threatening phone calls and hurled objects.

In an interview late Tuesday, Willis said, “My family--we’re all distraught right now.”

Her brothers, Ed Jackson, 31, and John Jackson, 37, said Tuesday’s events had shocked the family. Willis and D’Arcy were still seeing each other, they said.

“We need to pray for (LaBorde’s) family, we need to pray for this family,” Ed Jackson said. “To me, I think of (D’Arcy) as a good person.”

However, court documents reveal a different side of D’Arcy.

In court filings dated Aug. 31, 1988, Willis complained that D’Arcy attempted to choke one of her children after the youngster said he had felt sick and could not go to school. Among recommendations following that report, court officials stated D’Arcy “needs counseling for temper and behavior.”

A year later, Willis alleged that D’Arcy began twisting her neck when he became upset with the behavior of her children.

“I screamed, ‘You’re trying to kill me! You’re trying to break my neck!’ ” Willis is quoted as saying in court records. “I grabbed him to push him away. I wanted to call police, he wouldn’t let me.”

Times staff writers Renee Lynch, Kevin Johnson and Lily Dizon contributed to this report.