State's high court upholds conviction in Ireland case
Advertiser Staff
HILO, Hawai'i — The Hawai'i Supreme Court has affirmed the 2000 conviction of Albert Ian Schweitzer for the kidnapping, rape and murder of Dana Ireland in one of the most notorious criminal cases in recent state history.
The court rejected allegations by Schweitzer's lawyer that Hilo Circuit Judge Riki May Amano wrongly denied a request to move the trial to a different circuit, and also rejected arguments that the defendant's lawyer during the trial did not represent him effectively.
ALBERT SCHWEITZER
Schweitzer is serving a life term plus two 20-year terms, with a 130-year minimum sentence.
The court had already upheld the conviction of co-defendant Frank Pauline Jr., who confessed in June 1994 to taking part in the murder of Ireland on Christmas Eve 1991.
In that confession, which he later disavowed, Pauline said that he and Schweitzer's younger brother Shawn were passengers in a 1956 Volkswagen driven by Schweitzer.
Pauline said the trio saw Ireland, 23, riding a bicycle near Kapoho, and that Albert Schweitzer turned the car around and hit her. Pauline said Schweitzer then reversed the car and ran over Ireland a second time.
He said the men loaded the woman into the front trunk of the Volkswagen and took her to a dirt road, where the older Schweitzer raped her. Pauline admitted swinging a tire iron at Ireland's head.
He was sentenced to three life terms and is serving a 180-year minimum term.
Shawn Schweitzer, who was 16 at the time of the murder, received one year in prison and five years of probation after pleading guilty to kidnapping and manslaughter.
