Hawaii man killed self after police took DNA sample in Virginia woman’s 1991 killing

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A man who was identified as a new possible suspect in the killing and sexual assault of a Virginia woman who was visiting Hawaii more than three decades ago killed himself recently after police took a DNA swab from him, officials said.

The Hawaii Police Department on Monday said they matched DNA taken from Dana Ireland’s body to that of 57-year-old Albert Lauro Jr. of Hawaiian Paradise Park on the Big Island. Police Chief Ben Moszkowicz said Lauro died by suicide and was found at home.

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Authorities zeroed in on Lauro in recent months and got a DNA sample from him off of a discarded fork after they watched him eat lunch. He killed himself last week after police went to his home to test the sample against a swab taken from him in person.

Attempts by the AP to reach Lauro’s relatives were unsuccessful.

The DNA work represented a major development in a case that made headlines last year when Albert "Ian" Schweitzer, who had been incarcerated for more than 20 years for the killing, was released based on new evidence. Ireland's body was found on Christmas Eve in 1991 on Hawaii's Big Island.

A court officer removes Albert "Ian" Schweitzers handcuffs following the judge's decision to release him from prison immediately, after spending more than 20 years in prison, Jan. 24, 2023, in Hilo, Hawaii.  (Marco Garcia/The Innocence Project via AP Images, File)

Schweitzer was one of three men who spent time behind bars over her killing, but he always maintained his innocence. A judge is expected to rule Tuesday on a motion to officially exonerate him.

Police said the DNA evidence gave them probable cause to bring rape charges against Lauro but the statute of limitations on such charges expired years ago. Murder is still within the statute of limitations for Ireland’s death but police said they didn’t have enough evidence to charge Lauro with murder.

"The presence of Lauro’s DNA at the crime scene was, in and of itself, not sufficient evidence to prove that Lauro intentionally or knowingly caused her death," Moskowicz said at a news conference livestreamed from Hilo.

Police hope Lauro's cellphone will provide some answers and that family and friends who knew him in 1991 and now will help police determine what happened, Moskowicz said.

Schweitzer's attorneys took the police to task, alleging that they intentionally botched the investigation into Lauro by not taking steps to ensure that he didn’t flee or kill himself after they obtained his DNA. They suggested that because of the man's death, the truth about what happened to Ireland will never come to light. They also demanded a federal investigation, as well as all communications related to the DNA work.

"We knew that he had a family. He had a good life," Innocence Project co-founder Barry Scheck, who is assisting the Hawaii Innocence Project in Schweitzer's case, said of Lauro. "It’s well known in law enforcement circles … if you have DNA on a guy and you know he committed the crime, that if you do not bring him into custody, there is a serious chance that the person will flee, destroy evidence or kill themself."

Moskowicz said if police arrested Lauro without probable cause, a court wouldn’t have accepted evidence they gathered afterward.

He denied police sabotaged the case.

"That is abjectly false, 100% not true," he said, adding the police would follow the evidence wherever it goes.

Mayor Mitch Roth, who was the Big Island's top prosecutor when Schweitzer’s attorneys and prosecutors entered into a "conviction integrity agreement" to reinvestigate the case, said Monday that he stands behind the police and noted that the results from the swab they collected didn't come in until after Lauro died.

Lauro hadn't been on law enforcement's radar when Roth was prosecutor: "I don’t recall ever seeing this person in any of the police reports when I went over the case."

Moskowicz said Lauro was arrested once in 1987 for shoplifting when he was about 20 years old.

The push to find out who killed Ireland gained renewed traction after the January 2023 release of Schweitzer, who was convicted in 2000 and sentenced to 130 years in prison. Innocence Project lawyers who took up his case argued that he didn’t match the DNA on a T-shirt found near Ireland. The shirt didn't belong to Ireland but was soaked with her blood and contained DNA from an unknown man.

Even though Schweitzer was released, his legal team and prosecutors have continued to quibble over whether he’s actually innocent and deserves compensation for his years behind bars.

Schweitzer's Innocence Project attorneys tracked down a DNA match with help from Steven Kramer, a retired FBI attorney and federal prosecutor who led the genetic genealogy team that solved the Golden State Killer case in 2018. Kramer found a match, based on genetics, ancestry, age, and address history, among other factors.

Lauro, according to Innocence Project court filings filed Sunday, lived less than 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) from where Ireland's body was found along a fishing trail in a remote part of the Big Island. He would have been in his mid-20s at the time and owned or had access to a pickup truck that would have left the tire marks found at the scene, the filings said.

Innocence Project attorneys looked up his Facebook page and saw that he was still an avid fisherman and would have been familiar with the trail where Ireland was found.

On Monday, the attorneys called for a federal investigation into why police didn't arrest Lauro, saying they had probable cause to do so. In their filing, they ask for police and prosecutors turn over all communications about the decision not to seek an arrest warrant after the DNA from Lauro's fork was tested. They also want to know why he wasn't arrested before or after police took the DNA swab.

A 2023 petition filed in the quest to release Schweitzer, the last of the three Native Hawaiian men who remained imprisoned in the killing, outlined the case, which was one of Hawaii’s most notorious.

Ireland, who was 23 years old and visiting from Virginia, was found barely alive in the bushes along a fishing trail in Puna, a remote section of the island. She had been sexually assaulted and beaten, and later died at Hilo Medical Center. The mangled bicycle she had been riding was found several miles (kilometers) away and appeared to have been run into by a vehicle.

The killing remained unsolved for years.

A man named Frank Pauline Jr., who claimed to have witnessed the attack, told police that Schweitzer and his brother, Shawn Schweitzer, attacked and killed Ireland. But he was interviewed at least seven times and gave inconsistent accounts each time, eventually incriminating himself, leading prosecutors to indict Pauline as well as the Schweitzers.

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Pauline and Ian Schweitzer were convicted in 2000. Shawn Schweitzer took a deal to plead guilty to manslaughter and kidnapping — and receive credit for about a year served and five years of probation — after seeing juries convict Pauline and his brother in 2000. Pauline died in prison.

The Schweitzer brothers "are happy that this person was finally caught," said Kenneth Lawson, co-director of the Hawaii Innocence Project. "They’re disappointed in the way it happened."