Bond set for Sugar Grove man charged in 1981 murder

Bond has been set at $1 million for a deaf Sugar Grove man accused of murdering his disabled teenage girlfriend 27 years ago.

Gary Albert is accused of stabbing to death Dawn Niles in an attack on St. Patrick's Day 1981. He was arrested Sunday afternoon by Cook County sheriff's detectives.

Sheriff's police spokeswoman Penny Mateck says the 15-year-old Niles was last seen leaving Hinsdale South High School in Albert's vehicle. Fishermen found Niles' body four days after her disappearance in a pond in a Cook County Forest Preserve in Palos Park.

Mateck says the sheriff's department received a letter about two years ago from one of Niles' friends asking the case be reopened. Investigators were able to arrest Albert after conducting several witness interviews and the use of technology that was unavailable in 1981.