Episode 2: Five Names and a Face

Summary

CounterClock – Episode 2: "Five Names and a Face"

Host: Delia D'Ambra (Audiochuck)
Release Date: May 28, 2026

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Episode Overview

Delia D'Ambra takes listeners inside the aftermath of the 2008 Lane Bryant murders in Tinley Park, Illinois – a crime that left five women dead and one survivor. Episode 2 focuses on the "war room" investigation, the heartbreak of the five victims’ families, confusion and skepticism about the killer’s motive, and the first steps towards reconstructing what happened that fateful morning. The episode culminates in the release of a suspect sketch and raises lingering questions about motive and whether the lone assailant might have had help.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Setting up the "War Room" (01:15–04:37)

• Urgency and Secrecy:
  Within hours of the shootings, a multi-agency task force forms a war room – described as full of files, bulletin boards, and, unusually, tinfoil over the windows to guard against eavesdropping and leaks.
  • Quote (Rick Bruno, Former TPPD Commander, 01:58):
    "They had on one wall pictures of the victims...we work for these people...that was their motivation and everybody wanted to get this guy."
  • Only essential personnel, including the mayor, have access.
  • Tinfoil on the windows suggested extreme caution about confidentiality and possible media prying, with detectives worrying about leaks that could undermine their efforts or give away sensitive case details.

2. Victims and Identifications: Family Trauma Unfolds (04:37–14:46)

• The names of the victims are released at a press conference the day after the murders, creating shockwaves for families and those who knew them personally.
  • Maurice Hamilton (Rhoda McFarlane’s brother, 05:24):
    "When she called, she asked me, 'Hey, are you watching the news?'... So while I was sitting there, the number, kept going up."
  • Ben Bradley (Journalist, 08:36):
    “To see her name that day on the list of victims, you know, was startling.”
• Timeline of the crime:
  • Store opens at 10:00am.
  • Suspect enters (~10:10–10:15) posing as a delivery man, takes hostages, binds victims with duct tape, and rifles through purses.
  • Rhoda manages to dial 911 at 10:44am; police arrive just after 10:46am to find the bodies.
• Discrepancies in the Robbery Motive:
  • Only a small amount of cash is clearly stolen.
  • No substantial valuables (phones, jewelry, credit cards) are taken.
  • Families and investigators quickly question if this is truly a “robbery gone wrong.”
  • Michael Hudak (10:24):
    “Why would you pick a woman’s clothing store right when they open...it doesn't add up.”
  • Rick Bruno (13:07):
    "The timing, the target, the victims, that's not an armed robbery."

3. First 48 Hours – Media, Rumors, & the Survivor (14:46–18:21)

• The case generates intense media attention, with reporters crowding victims’ homes and investigating every angle, creating additional stress for families.
  • Michelle Talos (Jessica’s sister, 14:46): "Press lined up, parked up and down my street...some lady talking to me on the phone, and...somebody reached out and touched my hand, and it was the woman I'd just been talking to."
• Rampant rumors circulate, including false reports of an arrest, which police must publicly deny.
  • Rick Bruno (15:16): “If you put it out that we have someone in custody, it can hurt the investigation...he put it out and ended up having to retract it once the dust settled.”
• Survivor releases a statement (17:31), declining to recount her ordeal and asking for privacy:
  • Survivor statement (read by voice actor, 17:31):
    "Please know that during the unfathomable events of that day, their thoughts were focused on you and coming home."

4. Stories of Loss – The Victims’ Final Hours (18:21–34:20)

• Sarah Sifranski: Only 22, likely at the store to buy an outfit for a new job. Her family finds out via the news van outside.
• Carrie Chuso: On her way to buy a shawl, her husband Tony remembers painfully mundane last interactions.
  • Tony Chuso (20:00): “I said, I'll see you later. I love you. And we always wave at each other...that was my last interaction with her.”
• Connie Woolfolk: A single mother, remembered by her brothers and former partner for her strength and warmth. Her ex, Victor Rodriguez, learns what happened as the news is breaking on TV.
• Jennifer Bishop: In town for her husband's work conference, killed during a rare weekend getaway.
  • Michelle Talos (30:39):
    "My mom answered crying and told me that Jenny was dead. And I just laughed and was like, no, she’s not...I remember saying no. I think I said it like a million times."
• Randomness of Victims:
  • Each woman had a different reason for being at Lane Bryant, which increases the perception of randomness and deepens the tragedy.
  • Ben Bradley (34:25):
    “They were all in the store that day for different reasons, and they never came home.”

5. National Coverage & America’s Most Wanted (34:31–37:15)

• Investigators quietly partner with America’s Most Wanted, who publicize the case and the suspect’s sketch.
• Producer Jenna Griffiths arrives amid a bizarre coincidence: While reporting for the show, she assists in breaking another major case entirely unrelated to Tinley Park – further illustrating the chaos and oddities surrounding the investigation.
• Community shock is symbolized by a makeshift memorial of five white crosses, which becomes an enduring image for the case.
  • Marie (Sally Beauty Supply, 38:05):
    “You see the snow and you see these big white crosses. And people would come by just to talk about it. It was surreal.”

6. Store Employees and Survivor’s Safety (38:37–39:38)

• Lane Bryant offers therapy and relocation support to traumatized employees.
  • Survivor placed in protective custody; fear lingers she could be further targeted.
  • Erica Karstens (39:21): "I was worried that if it wasn’t the media...that somehow that person would find out that she survived and come back at her."

7. Release of Composite Sketch and Suspect Description (41:11–44:45)

• Survivor provides police with a detailed description, leading to the first public suspect sketch (~February 10, 2008).
• Description: African American male, 25–35 years old, 5’8”–6’2”, 230–260 lbs, clean-shaven, well-groomed, with 3–5 puffy cornrows and a single braid with four green beads.
  • Rick Bruno (42:38):
    "It was very detailed...unique. That's not something you can do yourself."
• Sketch is distributed everywhere, with police confident someone will recognize him, even visiting hair salons specializing in cornrows.
  • Ed Zabracki (44:25):
    "Did you put green beads in anybody's head lately?"

8. Skepticism Around the Sketch and Investigation Frustrations (45:01–47:18)

• As days go by and the reward swells to $60,000, no new leads materialize.
• Some families doubt witness sketch efficacy, worrying about accuracy under trauma.
  • Aaron Woolfolk (45:57):
    "If the young lady...is good at that, then I say it's maybe a good sketch. But if she's like me, I would say that the sketch is probably way off."
• Others (like Erica Karstens) trust the survivor’s detail recall.
• The Lingering Question: Why?
  • All interviewed continue to struggle with the killer’s motive, noting the extensive time spent in the store and low financial gain, with suspicions growing that the murders were not a “robbery gone wrong.”

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the Depth of Grief:
  "I just stood there and I just sat down inside. I couldn't, I didn't know what to say or what to do." – Tony Chuso (24:07)
• On the Waiting:
  “My parents aged half their lives right then and there. It was awful for them.” - Michael Hudak (23:59)
• On the Senselessness:
  "The why is what caused the theory about what was really going on to begin to bend further and further away from random robbery." – Narrator (47:10)
• On the Investigation’s Stakes:
  "We were confident somebody knew who he was, and our job was to try to convince them that it was important for them to come forth." – Rick Bruno (43:58)
• On the Victims’ Everyday Lives:
  "There were two onesies from Kohl’s in the backseat of her car. She had a tall Starbucks. She loved her coffee. So I would imagine she was just running into Lane Bryant to pick something up quickly." – Michelle Talos (33:31)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 01:15–04:37: The war room and secrecy measures
• 04:37–14:46: News of the victims' identities and families' reactions
• 18:21–34:20: In-depth accounts from families on the last hours before the murders
• 34:31–37:15: America's Most Wanted and memorials
• 39:41–41:52: Enhanced security and release of suspect sketch
• 41:52–45:01: Description distributed, community efforts, and initial disappointment
• 45:31–47:15: Doubts about the sketch and survivor’s identification
• 47:18–48:09: Unanswered questions about motive and future investigation

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Tone & Style

• Empathetic, investigative, community-focused: Delia D’Ambra’s tone is compassionate and patient, giving space for victims’ families to recount their experiences in detail and using their words to capture the heartbreak and confusion they endured.
• Methodical story-building, layering personal and procedural: The episode carefully contrasts the emotional devastation with the meticulous, secretive, and sometimes improvisational work of law enforcement and journalists.

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Summary

Episode 2 of CounterClock season chronicles the immediate aftermath of the Lane Bryant murders with raw, first-person recollections from grieving families, surviving employees, and dedicated investigators. It delves into the practical efforts to protect sensitive information, the overwhelming force of national media, and the relentless—though at times stymied—hunt for the perpetrator. Listeners are left with vivid images of grief, the chaos of the investigation, and emerging doubts about official explanations for the crime’s motive, setting up deeper questions to be explored in future episodes.

Transcript

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[Narrator / Interviewer]

This is Episode two Five Names and a Face A quick note. If while listening to this season you recognize any of the names or locations that are being discussed and have information you'd like to share, send me an [e-mail]. Within hours of the Lane Bryant shootings, Tinley park police and investigators from the south suburban Major Crimes Task Force had assembled a full fledged war room inside the village's small police headquarters. Former TPPD commander Rick Bruno remembers it well.

[Rick Bruno]

Full of files and file cabinets and they had on one wall pictures of the victims. I remember seeing we work for these people something along those lines, but that was their motivation and everybody wanted to get this guy.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The war room was strictly need to know basis. Only the village's mayor, Ed Zabracki, met that criteria.

[Ed Zabracki]

They had bulletin boards and they put everything up on the bulletin board. The slightest bit of information, even if it didn't make sense. There were notes and there were stickums and it was all set up.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The setup included of all items, tin foil. Reams of it pressed into the windows.

[Rick Bruno]

My colleagues and I noticed that tin foil was going up on some of the exterior windows and we thought that was a little odd.

[Ed Zabracki]

Access was extremely limited and one of the things they had to do is they put up aluminum foil on all the windows because there are ways of eavesdropping and at that time, you know, I'm not a techie, but they put up tinfoil to reflect any radio signals or whatever which Couldn't get in to see what was going on inside. They had some kind of meter to detect, I don't know, radio signals or something, but quote, unquote, somebody picked up something on a meter and so they immediately did that.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

So there was the thought that someone could be listening in.

[Ed Zabracki]

Could be, could have been anybody.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Former commander Rick Bruno told me that the tinfoil precaution, albeit unusual, was a reflection of just how serious the detectives assigned to the case took confidentiality.

[Rick Bruno]

We were worried that maybe the media was trying to get information and that information would get out before we were ready to let it get out. We were trying to keep certain details very confidential because we were getting thousands of tips, literally thousands of tips. Part of the way that you can determine whether or not the tip is legitimate or useful is when they tell you something that's totally not true about the situation. So certain facts we had to keep very confidential.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Was it the fear that they would

[Jenna Griffiths]

like, get their video cameras, like to

[Narrator / Interviewer]

look in the windows, or was it more like a listening device?

[Rick Bruno]

I think it was both. And I don't know if it was effective or not, but the media can be a little tenacious sometimes. But we were giving the media as much information as we could, as promptly as we could.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The first formal press conference was on Sunday afternoon, February 3rd. 24 hours after the murders. Rick and his colleagues knew it was time to feed the media beast. So the department released the names of the five victims. One by one, police read the names and ages off a list. All women, one as young as 22 years old. Four of the victims were customers. And then there was 42 year old Rhoda McFarlane, Lane Bryant's manager and the 33 year old survivor who was a sales associate for the store. Hearing the names of their loved ones publicly announced as murder victims landed heavy on the families. On the day of the crime, Rhoda's mother Barbara, worried something was wrong and had called one of Rhoda's brothers, Maurice.

[Maurice Hamilton]

When she called, she asked me, hey, are you watching the news? And I was like my, it's Saturday, why would I be watching the news? She said, boy, turn on the news. Said, mom, what's on the news that I need to see? She said, just turn the TV on, turn the channel five. It said one dead, one killed. And it's going across the bottom line. So while I was sitting there, it kept, the number, kept going up.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Most of Rhoda's family lived in Joliet, Illinois and in suburbs about 30 minutes west of Tinley Park. So on the day of the murders, there were a lot of phone calls back and forth between them to figure out what exactly was going on. Meanwhile, much closer to Brookside Marketplace in the suburb of Glenwood, Stuart Gibbs, Rhoda's boyfriend of more than a year, hadn't heard from her all morning, which he thought was unusual because she always called him while she was on her way to work or first thing after she clocked in. That particular day they'd made plans to get together after her shift, that was her off day.

[Stuart Gibbs]

But she went in because she took off Thursday. So she came in Saturday to make up for Thursday. I said, maybe she got tied up, you know, I didn't think nothing of it. Cause I know when she gets there she takes the money to the bank and stuff like that.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

But by noon, Stewart's optimism was waning.

[Stuart Gibbs]

I got a phone call and the phone call stated that, you know something about Rota, I'm like, or what's going on? Well, something happening up at the Lane Bryant in my mind, right? If anything went down, she would call me, you know what I'm saying? Anything to go down, she'll call me. So I was like, okay, let me call her. And normally when she work I don't call her. When she at work, I don't. So I said let me call her at work. So I called her cell phone and wasn't no answer on the cell phone. So when I called up there it was like I didn't get no answer. I said, oh shit, something is wrong. When I made it there, I saw the command center, I saw all these people out. I said, let me talk to the officer. And when I talked to the officer, he was like, he told me like, go to the police station.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

And it was there inside the police station that Stuart Rhoda's mother, Barbara Maurice and one of her other brothers encountered another family and quickly pieced together what had happened.

[Stuart Gibbs]

They was waiting just like we. So they called them in. And so when I saw, I saw the priest, I already made up my mind. I was like, she gone. I didn't express it to them. I knew, I knew then she was gone. Because something from my heart, the spirit of my heart left.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

At the press conference on Sunday, police confirmed what Stewart already knew. Rhoda had been killed along with four customers. 34 year old Jennifer Bishop, 22 year old Sarah Sifranski, 37 year old Connie Woolfolk and 33 year old Carrie Chuso. When Carrie's name was announced, journalist Ben Bradley who was sitting in the press pool, froze.

[Ben Bradley]

And I did a double take on one of them. Carrie Chuso, who I knew as Carrie Hudak. We went to high school together, graduated the same year. She was this, you know, incredibly effervescent, bright disposition person who, you know, talked to everybody and was friendly with everybody. She's one of those people who. Her name comes up and you're like, yeah, of course I know Carrie. To see her name that day on the list of victims, you know, was startling.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The only saving grace. Police announced there was a single survivor. So how did this happen? In order to create a timeline of that morning's events, I reviewed news coverage from 2008, police officials, statements about what the sole survivor told them, and I conducted my own interviews with family members of the victims. The timeline starts at 10am when the lane Bryant store opened to the public. About 10 to 15 minutes later, the suspect entered.

[Michelle Talos]

They told us the guy posed as a delivery guy and came in the back door.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

That's Michelle Talos, who lost her sister Jennifer. And here's Aaron Woolfolk, who lost his sister Connie.

[Aaron Woolfolk]

They knocked on the back door. Somebody opened the door. Who is this?

[Narrator / Interviewer]

And after that, the two employees, Rhoda and the survivor, were trapped. Over the course of Approximately the next 35 to 40 minutes, the suspect took Jennifer, Carrie, Connie and Sarah as hostages, either as they entered the store or while they were already inside.

[Michelle Talos]

They told us that their hands were tied together with duct tape. He did go through their purses.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

It's unknown, except maybe to police in what order the women were taken hostage. From what Kerry's husband Tony and her brother Michael told me about her personal movements that morning, it's believed she was one of the victims who came into the store while the crime was already in progress. And that's mostly based off when she departed her and Tony's home that morning.

[Tony Chuso]

She left at, like, 1020, 1025, according to one of the police officers who was talking to me who interviewed said she walked in on it.

[Michael Hudak]

From what I've been told, when she walked into the store, it was already ongoing. So she was, I think if she wasn't the last person to walk in, she was one of the last.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

At 10:44am Rhoda managed to get free from her bindings and dial 911-911-ERTENCY. When police arrived a few seconds after 10:46am they found the women's bodies and noted that their belongings had been rifled through. But as far as valuables that were missing, not a whole Lot was here's former Tinley park mayor Ed Zabracki.

[Ed Zabracki]

It was less than $150 in the till and the money was still there.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Items including the victim's jewelry, cell phones and credit cards were also left behind.

[Tony Chuso]

Whoever did this didn't take anything. All he took was cash.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Tony Chuso is certain his wife's purse was ransacked because she was carrying money with her when she left their place. And that money was never accounted for again.

[Tony Chuso]

Carrie had cash on her. I won a football pool the week before with Carrie's dad. It was money that I won. It was like a couple hundred dollars that was taken. All the cash was taken.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

For those closest to the victims, hard nosed journalists who were doing the math and even some investigators working the case. The narrative that the crime was simply a robbery gone wrong had some holes, some pretty big ones.

[Michael Hudak]

Why would you pick a woman's clothing store right when they open to go to. Of all the stores you could pick across any place in any town, why would you pick a woman's clothing store that's got probably zero to any money in the capture store at that point in time?

[Aaron Woolfolk]

The whole thing just, you know, at some point, you know, doesn't add up.

[Ben Bradley]

For somebody to be cold hearted enough to chat with the people in this store, pose as a delivery driver and then a switch flips and you kill them and then another switch flips that you go back about your life, presumably not talking about it, not committing a new crime. I mean that's, that's a lot of switches to flip in his favor.

[Rick Bruno]

The length of time that he stayed in the store before things went really bad, none of it made sense. It didn't make sense. The timing, the target, the victims, that's not an armed robbery.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

But until investigators could do more digging, the nagging feeling that something was off was just that, a feeling. The same day police released the victims names and these additional details about the perpetrators ruse to gain access to the store charming shops. Lane Bryant's parent company announced it was offering a $50,000 reward for information. It was about that same time that news coverage about the case ramped up and went wall to wall. Journalists from all over Chicago clamored for scraps of information and interviews. And they weren't afraid to be pushy.

[Michael Hudak]

There were some that were truly wanted, you know, you could, you know, they wanted help. And then there was, there was, there was a couple that were just there for a story worldwide.

[Tony Chuso]

I could not believe how much attention this got. Like I didn't Stay in my house for a while. I stayed with Carrie's parents because I. There's. I couldn't be there by myself. And so I was at their house, and the whole family was there. This was the first night, I believe. Yes. And the second night, it was that Sunday, because the Super Bowl. Actually, the super bowl was the next day. And so, like, cousins, like, the whole family was there, and news people were coming up to their house, knocking on the door. And, like, it was very, like, intrusive. Very, like, you know, just people just trying to get a story. And it was just. It was rough.

[Michelle Talos]

There was press lined up, parked out up and down my street. Remember some lady talking to me on the phone, and I hung up with her, and I went out in the garage to get a soda out of the refrigerator, and somebody reached out and touched my hand, and it was the woman that I had just been talking to.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

In the first 48 hours, rumors ran rampant that authorities had already nabbed a person of interest, when in reality, they'd only questioned one or two men who loosely fit the suspect's appearance.

[Rick Bruno]

I got a phone call from one of the Chicago media, major media outlets, and he said, hey, we hear that you've got somebody in custody. I said, no, we don't have anybody in custody. He goes, well, I have a source that says you guys picked somebody up and you got someone in custody. And I said, look, I'm telling you, we don't have anybody in custody. If we did, I. I would say so. We don't have anybody in custody. We do not have a suspect. And he said, well, I have to go with my source. I said, look, I can't tell you what to say and what not to say. All I can tell you is if you put it out that we have someone in custody, it can hurt the investigation. He goes, well, I have to go with my source. I said, fine. So he put it out and then ended up having to retract it once the dust settled. And he called me later, and I told him, look, I'm not going to lie to you. If I have information that I can give you, I will give it to you.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Former mayor Ed Zabracki was also fielding inquiries from the press, many of whom were after authority's most valuable lead, the survivor.

[Ed Zabracki]

Sunday afternoon, Sunday evening sometime, I got a call from Good Morning America and a couple of those other things who wanted me to arrange to get her to go on, you know. And I says, first of all, I would recommend to her not to do it. And number Two, I'm going to tell you straight up front, I don't know who she is. And they said you're BSing me? No, I said, that's by design.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Journalist Ben Bradlee remembers tension between the police and the press seemed to grow rapidly with each passing hour.

[Ben Bradley]

A responsible journalist will understand and navigate the need to know with the need to protect an investigation. Just as a responsible law enforcement agency will understand the line between I need to protect the investigation. But I also can't let bad information or wrong information live out there.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Whether it was a gesture of good faith or simply coincidental timing. Within days of the crime, authorities presented the media with an official statement from the survivor. A spokesperson for the Tinley park police read the message, but I'm having a voice actor read it for you in this format.

[Voice Actor (Survivor Statement)]

On Saturday, February 2, an unspeakable tragedy occurred and five of the bravest women I have ever met were senselessly murdered and taken from their families. My deepest sympathies and condolences go out to their families and friends. Please know that during the unfathomable events of that day, their thoughts were focused on you and coming home. My heart aches that they were unable to do so and I am working with the authorities in any way possible. All of the victims. I ask that the media please respect all our families and allow us to grieve and cope privately with the horrific crime that ripped our worlds apart. I also ask that everyone respect that neither I nor my family can discuss the horrible events of that day. I thank everybody who has expressed concern and asked that any person who can assist in the investigation contact the authorities immediately.

[Ed Zabracki]

The pressure she was under herself, you know, my God, I almost died. And secondly, the drama of seeing, you know, five other people next door to you lying next to you being killed. And so it was a slow process.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

In the midst of this media maelstrom, the victim's family members also had to process the reality that their loved ones were gone. 22 year old Sarah Safranski's family didn't respond to my requests for interviews, but they did speak with the South Town Star after the murders. Sarah's parents, Mary and Ted said that for most of the day on February 2, Sarah hadn't been picking up her phone. But they didn't necessarily think much of it. They had no idea she was one of the victims until a news van pulled in front of their home that evening. Around the same time they got a call from police. The South Town Star reported that the notification of Sarah's Death shattered her family's world. Sarah had recently graduated from college and was set to start a new job. Her mother told the newspaper the only reason she could think of as to why Sarah visited Lane Bryant in Brookside Marketplace that morning was to purchase a new outfit for work for Cary Chuso's husband, Tony. He'd noticed something was amiss not long after his wife departed their home on Saturday morning.

[Tony Chuso]

She left at, like, 10:20, 10:25.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Carrie's plan was to scoot right around the corner to Brookside Marketplace and buy a new shawl at one of her favorite stores, Lane Bryant. Then she was going to drop off a present for one of her nieces and eventually visit an ATM to get some cash out.

[Tony Chuso]

One of her college friends was in from California, and we were gonna meet up with her and all of her other friends downtown. I was waiting at home because Comcast was gonna come install cable. So she's like, I'll go get the shawl, drop off the presents, come back and get you, and then we'll leave standing in the garage. I, you know, gave her a kiss, and I said, I'll see you later. I love you. And we always wave at each other, as, you know, until they're out of sight. So I was able to wave her, and that was my last interaction with her.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

About 10 minutes after Carrie's departure, Tony got a hankering.

[Tony Chuso]

I was a smoker at the time, and I had my last cigarette, and I couldn't find the cigarettes. And I was like. I called him. I'm like, babe, where are the cigarettes? I can't find them. And I hung up. And then I found him. I'm like, disregard that message, babe. I'm sorry. I don't know why. Like, call me back. I love you. I found him. This was after she left. So I don't know. She didn't answer the phone.

[Jenna Griffiths]

Was that weird for her not to answer?

[Tony Chuso]

Yes, but I didn't think anything of it at the time because I'm like, she was in the store. She might have been, you know, rushing. And then that's when I started getting phone calls from my friends. A friend of mine that I grew up with called and said, hey, did you see what's going on at the target? He goes, there was a shooting at the target. And I'm like, what? And so I'm like, oh, Carrie's over there. And then I get another phone call from another guy at work. Like, chuso, did you hear what happened? You know. You know, the lame. Like, I'm like, yeah, I know. I'm like, I kept getting phone calls. I'm trying to call Carrie. I'm like trying to call Kerry. And so from there I called Penny, Car's mom. And I'm like, listen, something happened over there. I'm trying to get a hold of Carrie and she's not answering.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Tony's conversation with his mother in law, Penny, led to an even more panicked phone call between Penny and Michael Hudak, Cari's only sibling who lived in a nearby suburb.

[Michael Hudak]

My mom had called me and said, have you heard from your sister? And I said no. And my mom said, I'm coming over. Something's happened over by the target over there. And your sister was there. So I said, okay. So we, she came over and we couldn't get a hold of her and called and called and called. And you could see the things going on in the news with the helicopters flying overhead. There was traffic stopped everywhere. There's helicopters, you know, all over the place. And my mom jumped in my car and we tried to get into that area and they wouldn't let us. So we came back home, tried and tried and tried. And then watching the news reports, if, remember, if I'm remembering this correctly, that we saw her car in front of the, a few parking spots down from the Lane Bryant store.

[Tony Chuso]

All I can do is just, I kept trying to call her cell phone and Michael was like calling the police and everything. And he goes, tony, where was she shopping at? Where'd she go? And I'm like, lane Bryant. He goes, that's where it happened. And I just, my heart dropped. I didn't want to believe it. I didn't want to believe it, but I just, I was like almost mentally trying to prepare myself.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

By noon, Tony, Michael and Carrie's parents were at Brookside Marketplace.

[Tony Chuso]

As we were driving by, we were like, let's try to get into the parking lot. So we were able to get in. We drove by like the snow was really high at the time. It was a lot of snow. So it, we drove by and we talked to a police officer and they're like, go over by the Best Buy, like in the Best Buy parking lot. That's where the, the head, like, who we can talk to, they can give us more information. And we were talking and I looked and I saw her trailblazer in front of the, in front of there still. And they said just, they told us go to the Tinley park police station. We were the first family there. And as I was sitting there, I saw a woman Going like walking around the office picking up boxes of tissue.

[Michael Hudak]

We walked in, you know, we were told that she had been murdered. My parents aged half their lives right then and there. It was awful for them.

[Tony Chuso]

I just stood there and I just sat down inside. I couldn't, I didn't know what to say or what to do.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Had the Comcast DirecTV situation up and had like. You would have been with her, you think?

[Tony Chuso]

Yes, I would have, I would have been there. I don't know if I would have gone in because if she was just getting a shawl, I probably wouldn't go in and walk around in a women's store, but I would be there.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Did that weigh on you 100%?

[Tony Chuso]

Because I always think, you know, could I have done something to stop it? I feel like if I was there it might not have happened. Or if, you know, if we would have stopped at the cash station beforehand, you know, it wouldn't, wouldn't have happened. After it was said and done, I got up and I just like speed walked out of there and I just broke down and Rhoda's older brother came in, like gave me a big hug and I just broke down there.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

In the minutes and hours that followed, other families trickled into the police station, including Connie Woolfolk's next of kin. Connie was a single mother with two boys and she came from a family of all brothers. Her younger brother Aaron had never spoken publicly about the murders until I showed up at his house last summer.

[Aaron Woolfolk]

To us she was always like a second mother, right? You know, she would always try to be mom number two to us, you know, her younger brothers. She was going to tell you if something was wrong or she had to explain something to you. It would be just like your mother would. But other than that, I mean, she's just a really, really fun person, you know, caring person.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

At the time, Connie's two school age sons were at their father Victor Rodriguez's house in a neighboring suburb. Connie and her ex shared custody of their boys. And Saturday, February 2nd was Connie's rare chance to have a day to herself. She planned to go shopping, visit a salon and eat dinner with some girlfriends.

[Victor Rodriguez]

She was driven, she had a drive about herself to make it very intelligent.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

That's Victor, Connie's former partner.

[Victor Rodriguez]

She was incredible. She was an amazing woman. No matter what we went through, I was very happy to have her mother's. The day of her murder, my mother came by my house and we were just randomly just talking, just out the blue, I just kind of told her I love the fact that Connie is the mother of my kids. And as we were sitting down on the couch watching the footage on tv, that's what I told her. I love the Chinese mother of my kid.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

As the words left his mouth, Victor's eyes paused on the TV screen and the breaking news story, which prior to that moment, he'd only been half paying attention to.

[Victor Rodriguez]

I saw the car, a car in the parking lot turned resemble Connie's car. But you know, of course I didn't. I wasn't thinking of the worst.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The worst would come about a half hour later when one of Connie's brothers pulled into his driveway.

[Tony Chuso]

I wrote a little song to remind you. Choice hotels get you more of the experiences you value. The Cambria Hotel's got it all. A rooftop bar. Have a ball. Cocktails up here. Feel just right. This Cambria.

[Voice Actor (Survivor Statement)]

Amazing.

[Commercial Announcer]

All right.

[Tony Chuso]

Bring a date, your teen or even your mom. Book [e-mail] See you on the roof.

[Commercial Announcer]

Since he got out, bad things keep happening.

Cape Fear, a new series is streaming June 5th on Apple TV.

[Stuart Gibbs]

Why would I want to hurt you?

[Rick Bruno]

Why?

[Commercial Announcer]

Starring Academy Award winner Javier Bardem.

[Stuart Gibbs]

Why?

[Commercial Announcer]

And Academy Award nominee Amy Adams.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

He is coming after my family.

[Commercial Announcer]

Kate Fear, streaming June 5th on Apple TV.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Not long after watching a morning news story about a situation unfolding at Brookside Marketplace in Tinley Park, Victor Rodriguez's former brother in law showed up unexpectedly and and asked to take his boys to Connie's mom's house for the rest of the day.

[Victor Rodriguez]

So he puts the kids in the car and I'm like, man, what's going on? You know? And then that's when he said, man, Connie was in an accident. She was in an accident. We don't know what's going on. I'll keep you in tune with what's going on.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Shortly after that, the Woolfolks and Victor gathered together and then some of them went to Tinley park police station to join other grieving families.

[Victor Rodriguez]

Before I even walked in, I had my youngest son crying. I'm just. Words, pain, you know what I'm saying? And just knowing that I couldn't do nothing to help her, you know.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

About two hours east of Tinley park in South Bend, Indiana, Jennifer Bishop's older sister, Michelle Talos, had spent Saturday morning zipping her kids between various sports and activities. After lunch, she arrived home and was looking forward to a moment to recuperate

[Michelle Talos]

when suddenly I pulled into the garage and my husband came out and said, hey, we have to go to your mom and dad's. And I was like, okay, can I use the bathroom first? And he's like, nope, we gotta go right now. I goes, I don't know what's up, but something's up. And I was like, okay, this is really weird.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Michelle's mind started to spin with questions. Was one of her and Jennifer's parents gonna tell them they were terminally ill? Had they fallen? The scenario swirled in her head. Not once did her sister Jennifer's well being cross her mind though, because she knew Jennifer wasn't even in town.

[Michelle Talos]

Her husband had a work conference that was taking place in Tinley park, kind of their holiday gala thing. They were able to leave the kids with Brian's parents and went for a fun weekend away from the kids.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

A rare opportunity considering the fact that Jennifer and Brian's kids were super little at the time.

[Michelle Talos]

The youngest was six months old and then five and seven.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

As Michelle and her husband walked toward her parents place, she was completely unprepared for what she was about to hear.

[Michelle Talos]

Went to the front door and my mom answered crying and told me that Jenny was dead. And I just laughed and was like, no, she's not. Like, no way. And I just was like, no. I remember saying no. I think I said it like a million times.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

They huddled together, turned on their local news station, and Michelle watched, still incredulous to her current reality.

[Michelle Talos]

And there it was on tv. So we sat there just in disbelief and watched, you know what was going on and try to believe that it was our Jenny that was there. But then you could see her car in front of Lane Bryant. So shoot.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

In subsequent conversations with Brian, Jennifer's husband, the family learned that he'd been participating in a work conference at the couple's hotel all morning. On Saturday, Jennifer had told him she planned to check out a nearby mall, Brookside Marketplace, because there were stores there she liked. When Jennifer failed to meet up with her husband during a lunch break at the hotel, he'd realized their van was still gone. At that exact same time, he learned from people at the hotel that there had been a shooting at Brookside Marketplace. Brian had immediately gone to the scene and not long after was told his wife was one of the victims. The rest of that day he'd spent alone in an unfamiliar city, making unimaginable phone calls back home to family members in Indiana.

[Michelle Talos]

We were all so worried about him and just felt. Couldn't even imagine how he felt, how awful this was. And once I talked to him, I wanted to go there. I was like, I need to Go be with Jenny. I didn't want Brian to be alone. Didn't want my sister to be alone. That was how I felt. I think that's why I wanted to go there that night, like I was gonna be able to still save her or something.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

It wasn't until the following day, Sunday, February 3rd, the same day as police's first press conference the that Michelle made it to Tinley park in person.

[Michelle Talos]

We were invited to a meeting at the police station. And I went. I think Brian went. It was really weird to me because they had rental trap on the windows. And I was like, what the heck? They had tinfoil on all their windows in there. And they're like, oh, man. People will do anything to get a story or to get part of what we're talking about. So, you know, we don't want them to know. They didn't want the media to know certain things, and they didn't want us to know certain things because they wanted to preserve the things that only the killer would know.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

But even with all this secrecy, investigators did reveal some details to Michelle, mostly what they believed Jennifer had been doing shortly before her death. And it was as wholesome as anything could be.

[Michelle Talos]

There were two onesies from Kohl's in the backseat of her car. She had a tall Starbucks in her car, and she loved her coffee. So I would imagine she was just running into Lane Bryant to pick something up quickly. I remember thinking, okay, I know you were at Kohl's. Why didn't you go look at shoes one more time for 10 minutes and then you could have missed it? Why didn't you have to go to the bathroom? Why. Why wasn't the line longer at Starbucks? I wish I could have warned her. If I would have known, if I would have had any inkling, I would have begged her not to go to Tinley park that weekend.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The notion that Jennifer and the rest of the women were seemingly just in the wrong place at the wrong time is what made the situation so tragic,

[Ed Zabracki]

so in a sense, random in that it could happen to anyone.

[Ben Bradley]

They were all in the store that day for different reasons, and they never came home.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

As friends and family of the victims sat with their grief, Tinley park police and the south suburban major crimes task force shifted their focus to finding the suspect. They quietly began working with arguably the heaviest hitting true crime television show in America at that time.

[Ed Zabracki]

I'm John Walsh. Tonight on America's Most Wanted, we've got the story of a mass murderer near

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Chicago the weekend of the Lane Bryant massacre. Jenna Griffiths hopped on a plane and hightailed it to tinley Park. In 2008, she was a producer for America's Most Wanted. And in a series of events, she described to me as bizarrely serendipitous. She ended up chasing two breaking news stories for her employer that weekend.

[Jenna Griffiths]

I immediately flew out to Tinley park the next day. I think the shooting was on a Saturday, and I flew out on a Sunday. Another one of my fugitives had been caught because of the shooting.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Wait, what?

[Jenna Griffiths]

The fugitive's name was Esther Elizabeth Reed. It was an identity theft case out of South Carolina. She used the fake identity to get into Ivy League schools. I had traveled to Montana. I had traveled to, I believe, Portland, Oregon. I had traveled to South Carolina. All completely separate from Tinley park, having nothing to do with Tinley Park. These trips took place far, far, far before the Tinley park tragedy happened. Bizarre sheer coincidence. Esther Elizabeth Reed was staying in a hotel in Tinley park that weekend. And after the shooting, when police were doing surveillance in different parking lots, hoping to find the fugitive from or the perpetrator of the Tinley park tragedy, they noticed a suspicious car. And thinking that it could be related to the Tinley park tragedy, they began investigating that car. And that led them to a hotel room where Esther Elizabeth Reed was staying. I was already working because of Tinley park, and then I got a call that Esther Elizabeth Reed had been captured in Tinley Park. And I was like, what the heck? Unfortunately, they didn't catch the Tinley park killer, but they did catch another fugitive that weekend.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

A bittersweet conclusion, at least for Tinley park investigators. I've gone pretty far down the Esther Elizabeth Reed rabbit hole. And like police, I feel confident her being in Tinley park the same weekend as the Lane Bryant murders is purely coincidence. She was a con woman on the run, crossing through the Midwest. That's pretty much it. So once Jenna and America's Most Wanted put a check mark next to Esther's name, Jenna refocused her attention on the five women who'd been killed at Lane Bryant, starting with a trip to Brookside Marketplace.

[Jenna Griffiths]

It was freezing. There was snow on the ground. It was just so stark. I remember being there at night, you know, and of course, there were candles lit, somber and sad. I remember thinking they were just doing the best that they could and that everybody and everyone was just shocked that the person had gotten away.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Five white crosses stood planted in a median in front of the plaza.

[Police Officer / Reporter]

Several yards away, there's a makeshift memorial. Throughout the day, people drive by and stop and leave pictures, notes and flowers.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The haunting image of the Snow White crucifixes has become synonymous with this case over the years. Marie, the ear witness to the crime, who worked at Sally Beauty Supply, all but winced every time she walked by them on her way to work. Yeah, she had to go back within a day or so of the crime.

[Marie (Sally Beauty Supply Employee)]

You know, it was February, so it was like snowing and stuff. So you see the snow and you see these big white crosses. And people would come by just to talk about it. It was surreal. The only way I can explain it is surreal. I've never dealt with anything like that before. I think a couple of my employees were. They were frightened.

[Erica Karstens]

Me too.

[Marie (Sally Beauty Supply Employee)]

Like, you know, thinking about how easily that could have been our location. You know, when it hits you and you're watching the news, like, how close something like that was to you, and it's just really scary.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Fear and anxiety were intense feelings that Erica Karstens, a Lane Bryant employee who'd been off on the day of the crime, was grappling with, too.

[Erica Karstens]

The corporate offices flew down, and we all met at a location, was a secret location at the time to meet about all the events and with all the police officers that were involved to give us updates like, here's what happened, here's what we know. And we were all just trying to make sense of it, but they're like, hey, we'll take care of you guys. We'll offer you this, we'll offer you a severance, we'll offer you pay, we'll offer you if you want to relocate to a different location. Whatever you guys want to do, we're going by you. So they really try to take care of us in a sense of, like, therapy and giving us time off that was paid because they knew we were all pretty shook up about it. They let us know about the update, about the survivor and how she was, you know, put in protective custody. I was happy that she had survived, but I was scared, not just for her life, because I was worried that if it wasn't the media that was going to release her name, that somehow that person would find out that she survived and come back at her. What if this guy had. Has her information, has all of our information?

[Narrator / Interviewer]

No one knew the answers to those questions. There were so many things law enforcement needed to find out. With America's Most Wanted working behind the scenes, police were banking that a segment set to air on the program at a later date would help drive useful information their way. In the meantime, authorities kept at it the good old fashioned way.

[Police Officer / Reporter]

The police department has added extra patrols. They're reviewing security tapes from around the area and investigating more than 200 tips. In the shopping center's parking lot, yellow police take Cortons off an area in front of the Lane Bryant several yards away.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The boarded up clothing store remained closed indefinitely for good reason.

[Rick Bruno]

There was a 24 hour watch in the front, in the back of the store for several days afterwards because if the technicians needed to go back in, we needed to maintain the chain of custody of the store.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Police also scoured partially frozen retention ponds that abutted Brookside Marketplace that was searched by divers.

[Rick Bruno]

Because we thought maybe the guy threw the gun out the window or whatever. If he was in a car, if he was on foot, maybe we thought he'd try to get rid of the weapon.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The weekend after the murders, the biggest update yet made headlines. The lone survivor was able to get a look at the shooter and provided officials with a description that led to this sketch.

[Brandi Churchwell]

In the world of true crime, the real story isn't always in the headlines. It's in the evidence. I'm Brandi churchwell, host of 13Zero podcast, and I'm here to take you past the news cycle and straight into the courtroom. Every week I'll break down the investigation, the prosecution, the defense, and everything that unfolds beyond the jury box. We'll examine everything, every testimony, every exhibit and every hidden motive. Listen to 13th Juror, wherever you get your podcasts.

[Police Officer / Reporter]

The woman who survived has been working with police to craft a composite sketch of the suspect.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

By February 10, one week into the investigation, there was officially a face and a more specific description for the unknown offender, thanks to the sole survivor, the one woman who'd made it out alive. She described the shooter as an African American male between 25 and 35 years old with a medium complexion and broad shoulders. He was somewhere between 230 and 260 pounds, 58 to 6 2, with a clean shaven face and well groomed with manicured nails. The most distinct information about him though, was what he looked like from the eyes up. He had three to five puffy cornrows going front to back and a single braid of hair with four green beads on the end laying against his right cheek.

[Rick Bruno]

It was very detailed. The guy's hairstyle was very detailed and unique. That's not something that you can do yourself. So somebody who knew how to do hairstyles did that for him.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Marie from Sally Beauty Supply and Erica Karstens, the Lane Bryant employee who was off that day, racked their brains when they first saw the composite sketch.

[Erica Karstens]

When I saw the picture, I was like, okay, I have no idea who this person is. No idea. Because especially the characteristics they had in those drawings. I'm like, yeah, I would remember. I'm good with faces. I'm terrible with names, but I'm great with faces. I would remember that face.

[Marie (Sally Beauty Supply Employee)]

It was every customer from then on out. I looked with a different lens. There was this, like, I should be paying more attention. Did I see this person in the days leading up or, you know, I asked all my employees. You know, we shared. We talked about it amongst ourselves and that kind of thing. But it was definitely gave me a different perspective that I carried with me even to this day.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The specificity of the killer's appearance, the fact that flyers featuring his likeness were distributed nationwide and that a substantial reward was up for grabs were three things that law enforcement considered favorable to making an arrest.

[Victor Rodriguez]

That was plastered on every window, every stop sign. He couldn't get away from it.

[Rick Bruno]

We were confident that somebody knew who he was, and our job was to try to convince them that it was important for them to come forth. And we went to churches, we went to all kinds of different places, Community events, to try to convince people that this guy was dangerous and that he needed to be caught and that we needed their cooperation.

[Ed Zabracki]

The individual involved was African American, so they went to places who did cornrows and did you put green beads in anybody's head lately?

[Rick Bruno]

This was a guy that was still on the loose. And I saw the media as a way to get the word out and to maybe shake someone's conscience, to give us the information that we needed to find this guy. There was reward money that was put up. If the tragedy wasn't enough to shake somebody's conscience, we were trying to go beyond that. Okay, here's some financial gain that, you know, all we need is an arrest.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

But as the days passed and the reward money increased to $60,000, disappointment set in. If people called the dedicated tip line that Tinley park police had set up, it doesn't appear they offered a name that led authorities to the killer. So some folks couldn't help but ask, was the sketch inaccurate? Former mayor Ed Zabracki and even some family members of the victims, including Maurice Hamilton and Aaron woolfolk, thought, maybe sketches

[Ed Zabracki]

like that are sometimes either I outsider looking in. They're either very good or very bad. There seems to be no in between. So, I don't know, maybe someday we'll

[Maurice Hamilton]

find out that sketch Ain't gonna do it. Cause you got a bunch of nationalities that look like that particular person. How do we know that that wasn't a pull on and he was not bald headed?

[Aaron Woolfolk]

Some people do have, like my wife, right, she could see something one time and give you everything a person had on and what he was wearing, what she was wearing, hairstyle. Me, I can't do it right, you know, so if the young lady or the person who gave the sketch, she has a vivid imagination and she's good at that, then I say that it's maybe it's a good sketch. But if she's like me, I would say that the sketch is probably way off. Could you even imagine, you know, shots ringing out, people dying, lot of noise. How much could you really concentrate to try to figure out what a person look like, what he had on, how his hair was, you know, so some people could do it. And I pray to God that, you know, she was one of those people that could do it.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Erica Karstens, who knew the Survivor and had previously worked many shifts with her at Lane Bryant, had no doubts though that the image was likely accurate.

[Erica Karstens]

She was always good with recalling details. Like she would know, like if you came in like a week ago, she was like, oh, you were just here for da, da, da. So she was really good just with any detail. So for her to be like, hey, here's how it happened, here's who it was, here's this, here's that, like that, I wouldn't put it past her.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

But regardless of how good the sketch was or wasn't, the bigger question still plaguing everyone involved was why.

[Ed Zabracki]

That is going to be probably the

[Stuart Gibbs]

biggest issue of all.

[Ed Zabracki]

Motivation.

[Rick Bruno]

It was a very odd thing.

[Maurice Hamilton]

What were you doing in there for 40 minutes? What is your mind state?

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The why is what caused the theory about what was really going on to begin to bend further and further away from random robbery.

[Aaron Woolfolk]

They told us she fought back.

[Michelle Talos]

We know, we have DNA. And I'm like, well, how do you know?

[Narrator / Interviewer]

A surveillance camera at a Target store about 100 yards away captured the images. And Fox TV's America's Most Wanted paid a NASA scientist to enhance it.

[Rick Bruno]

We contacted NASA.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

The question is, did this gunman do this alone?

[Ed Zabracki]

It was always a question.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

Does it remain a question?

[Ed Zabracki]

Yes.

[Narrator / Interviewer]

That's coming up in the next episode of counterclock. Episode three, 40 minutes. Listen right now.

[Commercial Announcer]

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[Kylie Lowe]

Every case file, interview and archive tells a piece of the truth. I'm Kylie Lowe, and on my podcast, Dark down east, original reporting is at the heart of every case I cover. I don't just retell crime stories, I investigate them. I'm speaking with families, searching court records and piecing together the facts that have been overlooked and forgotten with time. The result? True crime storytelling that digs as deeply into a case as you do. You can listen to Dark down east

[Narrator / Interviewer]

wherever you get your podcasts.