Woman is fatally shot and set on fire after she was ambushed by three people during meeting to buy puppy

A South Carolina woman who believed she was buying a puppy was ambushed by three people who f@tally shot her, set her body on fire and left her to burn inside a car on the side of the road. 

Dana Marie Kinlaw, 40, was lured to a rural road in Effingham, South Carolina, on Jan. 22. 

On getting there, she was allegedly k!lled by 19-year-old Iryanna Jarissa Fleming and 31-year-old Daquinn Taheen Thomas and Nikko Christopher Carraway, according to the Florence County Sheriff’s Office. 

Officials believe Kinlaw’s de@th was part of a retaliation murd£r for a recent k!lling in neighboring Darlington County, WBMF reported. 

Kinlaw was driving with Fleming when they stopped on Atlantic Road near Springbranch Road in rural woodlands 95 miles east of the state capital in Columbia. 

“Supposedly, they went there together,” Florence County Sheriff TJ Joye told the outlet. “Miss Fleming, she was 19 years of age, a friend of Miss Kinlaw, and they rode there together supposedly to buy a puppy.” 

Fleming and Thomas are accused of setting up the fake sale for a puppy Kinlaw had been eyeing to persuade her to travel to the area where they allegedly launched their ambush attack. 

Kinlaw, a South Carolina resident, was fatally shot before the suspected k!llers poured a liquid over her body and set her on fire inside the car, the sheriff’s office said. 

Deputies were called to the area about a car on fire and discovered the vehicle still engulfed in flames with a human body inside. 

Florence County Coroner Keith Von Lutcken identified the remains as Kinlaw’s body. 

Von Lutcken ordered Kinlaw’s body be sent to the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston for an autopsy. The results have not been released. 

Fleming and Thomas were both arrested hours after Kinlaw’s d£ath and charged with murd£r, first-degree arson and possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime. 

Carraway was arrested on Wednesday and was charged with the same three crimes as his alleged accomplices. 

Officials said the murd£r was related to another k!lling 35 miles away in Darlington County and involved Kinlaw’s son, but didn’t share further information. 

“We believe there was a murd£r committed in Darlington County, which we made the arrest in Lake City that connects them to that arrest with Darlington County officials,” Joye told WBMF. “We feel that her son was involved in that in some way, shape, or form, and we feel this is a retaliation to that murd£r.” 

Both Thomas and Carraway have a long list of criminal cases in Florence County dating back as far as 2014, according to court records. 

Thomas faced multiple attempted murd£r charges and violent armed robbery cases. He was sentenced to 9 months in prison back in March 2025 for possessing a firearm as a convicted criminal.