Police ID suspect in Dana Ireland murder case

Hawaii Island police have announced the identification of a suspect via DNA evidence in the 1991 murder of Dana Ireland.

He is 57-year-old Albert Lauro Jr., who reportedly died of suicide last week after being visited by police regarding the case.

Age 23 at the time of her death, Ireland was kidnapped, raped, and murdered in the Kapoho area of Hawaii Island on Dec. 24, 1991. She died the next day at the Hilo Medical Center.

“For 33 years, our department has been resolute in investigating the Dana Ireland case,” said Hawaii Police Department Chief Benjamin Moszkowicz in a statement earlier today.

As part of the HPD’s investigation, several pieces of evidence were recovered, some of which contained DNA evidence. Specifically, DNA was recovered from a swab taken from Ireland’s body, from a sheet used to transport Ireland to the hospital, and from a T-shirt found at the scene.

While it was analyzed at the time, there was no match in any DNA database, and the person whose DNA was found at the scene became known as “Unknown Male #1.”

In 2008, the DNA evidence was sent to the Forensic Analytical Crime Lab in California, where it remains today, as part of a cooperative agreement with the Innocence Project.

In the decades since Ireland was murdered, DNA technology has evolved significantly. Additional DNA evidence was collected from the T-shirt and found to match the other samples from the scene.

In addition, experts are now able to take data from a DNA sample and build a family tree based on the known DNA from relatives. Earlier this year, an FBI agent from the Honolulu Field Office contacted police investigators with the names of some people who could potentially be identified as “Unknown Male #1.”

One of the names provided was that Lauro Jr., who lived in the Kapoho area at the time of the murder.

Based on that information, police surveilled Lauro Jr., attempting to gather further evidence.

In early July, they collected a utensil that he had been using after he discarded it. The DNA from the utensil was analyzed and found to be a match to “Unknown Male #1.”

While the DNA at the scene and from the victim certainly established probable cause that “Unknown Male #1” had committed the offense of rape, the statute of limitations for that charge ran out several years prior.

The only remaining crime still within the statute of limitations was murder. Based on what the investigators knew at the time, there was not enough information to establish probable cause to arrest Lauro Jr. for murder.

Investigators obtained a court order to obtain a buccal swab from Lauro’s cheek as confirmation that the DNA taken directly from him matched the DNA collected at the crime scene 33 years earlier.

On Friday, July 19, Lauro Jr. was asked to come to the station and talk with investigators, according to HPD.

The encounter was consensual, and he was not in police custody at the time. After speaking with investigators, Lauro Jr. asked to leave and was allowed to do so after the court-ordered buccal swab was collected.

The swab was sent to Forensic Analytical Crime Lab, along with a request to rush the analysis and return the results as soon as possible. Based on that analysis, HPD can now confirm that the DNA collected at the crime scene matched Lauro Jr., who was a resident of Hawaiian Paradise Park.

“The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects individuals from unwarranted search and seizure,” Moszkowicz said. “In order to obtain a search warrant, investigators would have to have established probable cause for the crime of murder and explained specifically what evidence it was seeking.

“We remain focused on Dana Ireland, a young woman who was brutally murdered. There is still a lot about this case that we do not know and our investigation into this case continues to push forward. Our search for the truth is not over,” he added.

People with information relative to this investigation should contact Hawaii Police Department Area I Criminal Investigation Division Captain Rio Amon-Wilkins at (808) 961-2251 or via email at Rio.Amon-Wilkins@hawaiicounty.gov.

See Tuesday’s Tribune-Herald for more of this story.