Hawaii Teacher Gets More Years in Prison - Updated

(Hilo, Hawaii) Former teacher Lynn M. Dionise received bad news this week while serving five years in federal prison on methamphetamine charges.

She was sentenced in state court to 10 more years, also for methamphetamine, to be served consecutively.

Big Island Circuit Judge Glenn Hara on Wednesday sentenced Lynn M. Dionise, 53, a former special-education teacher at Keaukaha Elementary School, to serve 10 years following her release from a California federal prison in May 2014.

"I think consecutive sentencing was appropriate sentencing given her involvement in drug dealing," said Deputy Prosecutor Jason Skier.

Dionise was found to be in possession of one-eighth of an ounce of methamphetamine in her Keaukaha apartment, along with $13,245, and was arrested April 29, 2008, Skier said.

So, Dionise will do a full 15 years of hard time for her involvement with methamphetamine. Let that be a lesson to all you youngsters.

* * * * *
Hawaii Teacher Gets Prison for Drugs
[Previous 11/18/09 post]
(Hilo, Hawaii) In April 2008, a 51-year-old special-education teacher at Keaukaha Elementary School, Lynn M. Dionise, was arrested for trafficking in methamphetamine after a police raid on her condominium.

Yesterday, U.S. District Senior Judge Susan Oki Mollway sentenced Dionise, now 52, to five years in prison and five years of supervised release for conspiring to distribute methamphetamine.

The FBI says Dionise was among a group of 10 people who brought methamphetamine into Hawaii from California in 2007 and 2008 and distributed the drugs on Oahu and the Big Island.

The government said the group used Dionise's condominium as a meeting place and that Dionise used her credit card to arrange airline flights and car rentals for members of the group.

All but one of her co-defendants in the federal case have pleaded guilty.

Dionise also faces state charges of trafficking and possession of methamphetamine which remain to be adjudicated.

Judge Mollway is allowing Dionise to remain free on bail until February 1, 2010, when she must turn herself in to begin her federal sentence.