Nearly 32 years after a Virginia visitor was kidnapped, beaten, raped and left for dead in 1991 on a remote trail in Puna on Christmas Eve, a Hilo judge vacated the murder conviction of the last man remaining in prison for the crime after hearing new evidence that he didn’t do it.

Albert “Ian” Schweitzer, 51, was immediately unshackled in the courtroom to reunite with his family Tuesday afternoon after 23 years in prison. He was serving a 130-year sentence in an Arizona prison contracted by the state to house Hawaii inmates.

The decision prompted applause in the Hilo courtroom and hugs for Schweitzer, who was flown to the Big Island for the hearing.

“My feelings were all over the place,” Schweitzer told The Associated Press during a phone interview in recalling the moment of his release. “Nerves, anxiety, scared.”

The justice system is “flawed,” he said, calling himself one of many imprisoned for crimes they didn’t commit. He earlier told reporters that he was “grateful” for the judge doing the “honorable thing.”

A petition filed late Monday outlined additional evidence in one of Hawaii’s biggest killings.

Dana Ireland, 23, was found in 1991 barely alive in the bushes along a fishing trail in Puna, and later died at Hilo Medical Center. The mangled bicycle she had been riding was found several miles away and appeared to have been run into by a vehicle.

The slaying of blond-haired, blue-eyed Ireland gained national attention and remained unsolved for years, putting intense pressure on police to find the killer.

“Whenever you have a white, female victim … it gets a lot more attention than people of color and Native Hawaiians,” Kenneth Lawson, co-director of the Hawaii Innocence Project, told the AP. “The parents, understandably, were becoming more and more infuriated. … There was insurmountable pressure to solve this case. And when that happens, mistakes are made, some intentional and some unintentional.”

With help from the Innocence Project in New York, the co-counsel in the case, Lawson’s group represented Schweitzer, the last of three Native Hawaiian men convicted in Ireland’s death who had remained imprisoned.

“At a new trial today, a jury would not convict Mr. Schweitzer of Ms. Ireland’s sexual assault and murder,” the petition said. “In fact, a prosecutor would likely not even arrest Mr. Schweitzer for this crime.”

The likelihood that all three men participated in a sexual attack and left no trace of biological evidence — including a lack of evidence uncovered with advanced forensic testing — is “extraordinarily improbable,” the petition said.

Ireland’s relatives couldn’t immediately be reached by the AP for comment on the petition and Schweitzer’s release.

DNA evidence previously submitted in the case belonged to an unknown man, and all three of the convicted men were excluded as sources.

Third Circuit Judge Peter K. Kubota heard testimony from a DNA lab analyst and forensic tire and bite mark experts who outlined how none of the evidence linked Schweitzer or his two alleged co-conspirators to the killing.

Kubota alluded to a “great outrage in the community” and media that may have contributed to Schweitzer’s conviction, and noted that DNA analysis technology had significantly advanced since the 2000 conviction.

After hearing the evidence during a more than seven-hour-long hearing, Kubota ruled that it “conclusively proves that in a new trial a jury would likely reach a new verdict of acquittal.”

Kubota urged Schweitzer to make the best of the opportunity, “hug and love your family” and not focus on the anger and resentment toward the process or people that left him in jail for a third of his life.

None of the DNA evidence collected through a rape kit and bloodstained articles of clothing belonged to Schweitzer, his brother Shawn or Frank Pauline Jr., according to a memorandum in support of the petition, filed Monday.

The source of the DNA from “all the biological evidence in this case belongs to one individual, Unknown Male #1.”

The unknown suspect’s “skin and sperm cells were recovered from a Jimmy Z’ brand t-shirt soaked in Dana Ireland’s blood found near her body; Unknown Male #1’s sperm was also recovered from Ms. Ireland’s vaginal swab and hospital gurney sheet that was used to transport her; and Unknown Male #1’s DNA is consistent with the DNA on Ms. Ireland’s … underwear,” according to the memo.

“The DNA test results show they are innocent. … Unknown male No. 1 committed this horrendous crime,” said Barry C. Scheck, speaking in court before Kubota issued his ruling.

Matthew Marvin, a tire tread expert at Ron Smith & Associates Inc., testified Tuesday that the tread width, track width and wheelbase measurements calculated from crime scene evidence suggested a much larger vehicle than Schweit­zer’s 1953 Volkswagen Beetle.

“You’re usually looking at a truck, SUV or van. … You’re looking at a larger vehicle,” said Marvin, speaking in court via Zoom from Collinsville, Miss.

The “exclusion of the VW Beetle as the source of the tracks at the Waa Waa scene is extremely damaging to the prosecution” assertion that the car hit Ireland at the Kapoho Kai Drive location and then took her to the Waa Waa scene where she was beaten and raped, according to the memo. The Kapoho Kai Drive location of the bicycle crash had “less available tread evidence, but this evidence indicated that Ian’s VW Beetle likely did not produce the tread evidence there either.”

The court also heard from Dr. Adam J. Freeman, a forensic dental specialist who examined pictures of a bite mark on Ireland’s breast, saying a 2009 study from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine pointed out that bite mark evidence was not reliable.

The new evidence on bite mark analysis “would have disproven key allegations made by the prosecution, because today we now know that the pattern injury on Ms. Ireland’s breast was not a human bite mark,” according to the memo. Freeman also pointed out that two out of the three experts who looked at the bite mark evidence questioned whether it was a bite mark.

Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Shannon M. Kagawa tried to argue that an unknown suspect and the lack of DNA evidence were known to prosecutors and the jury 23 years ago, and they still convicted Schweitzer.

“The theory at trial was always that there was another individual involved,” said Kagawa, speaking in court. “The jury knew that and still found the defendant guilty.”

The Schweitzer brothers and Pauline were indicted in 1997 for Ireland’s death, but at one point the charges were dismissed because DNA evidence did not link them to semen found on Ireland and on her hospital gurney.

In 1994, police made what they believed to be a major breakthrough. A man facing charges for his role in a cocaine conspiracy contacted police and claimed his half brother, Frank Pauline Jr., witnessed Ireland’s attack, according to the stipulated-facts document.

Police interviewed Pauline, who was in his third month of a 10-year sentence for an unrelated sex assault and theft. He claimed brothers Ian and Shawn Schweit­zer attacked and killed Ireland. But he was interviewed at least seven times and gave inconsistent accounts each time, eventually incriminating himself, the stipulation document said.

The three were indicted again after another informant claimed Ian Schweitzer confessed to him in jail that Pauline raped and killed Ireland.

Pauline later said he told the police details about the Ireland murder to get them to drop drug charges against his half brother, who was facing cocaine conspiracy charges.

In a prison interview with the A&E show “American Justice,” Pauline compared his story to the tale of the boy who cried wolf. “Wasn’t me,” he said in a strong pidgin accent. But when he started telling the truth, he said, no one believed him.

Following the conviction of his brother and Pauline in 2000, Shawn Schweitzer accepted an agreement to plead guilty to manslaughter and kidnapping. He was credited for about a year served and got five years of probation.

In October, Schweitzer met with prosecutors and recanted. According to the memo, he pleaded guilty because his “parents did not want to risk losing another son and encouraged Shawn Schweitzer to do what he needed to do to come home and not suffer the same fate as his brother.”

Schweitzer “continues to feel immense guilt about agreeing to the confession and entering a guilty plea for a crime he did not commit and falsely implicating his brother,” the document said.

A polygraph test in November showed he was telling the truth when he denied any involvement in the killing, the document said.

Being back in Hawaii “tastes great,” Schweitzer told the AP.

“The air is good,” he said. “The water is good.”

DANA IRELAND

On Christmas Eve in 1991, the 23-year-old visitor from Virginia was found barely alive in the bushes along a fishing trail in Puna, on the Big Island. The mangled bicycle she had been riding was found several miles away and appeared to have been run into by a vehicle. She had been sexually assaulted and beaten, and later died at Hilo Medical Center.