Report: 1 woman survived attack that killed 5 at Ill. store; police won't confirm

TINLEY PARK, Ill. -- Even as they released detailed information about the man suspected in a deadly shooting spree at a suburban Chicago clothing store, police were tightlipped Monday about possible witnesses, refusing to confirm a 33-year-old woman survived the attack that left five other women dead.

A Kentucky family says their daughter was shot in the neck but survived the attack at the Lane Bryant clothing store in Tinley Park, according to a published report.

The gunman, who still was being sought Monday, bound all six women and then shot at their heads during the Saturday attack -- but one bullet hit the surviving woman's neck, The (Madisonville, Ky.) Messenger reported, citing a couple identified as the woman's parents.

The Associated Press is not naming the woman or her parents because authorities have not confirmed their information.

The suspect is a stocky black man, about 5-feet-9-inches, between 25 and 35 years old, and wore a black winter coat, knit cap and black jeans adorned with rhinestones on the back pocket during the attack, Tinley Park police Sgt. T.J. Grady said Monday at a news conference.

"Witnesses" told police the suspect had thick braided hair and a receding hairline, with one braid laying over the right side of his face at cheek level and four light green beads on the end of the braid, but Grady declined to say how investigators got such a detailed description or whether it may have come from a sixth surviving victim.

"I cannot, OK? The minute I'm able to confirm anything ... there's so much misinformation going on right now, the minute we're able to confirm anything, we will do that for you," Grady said.

The lone survivor, whose full name The Messenger withheld because the gunman remained at large, is a student and worked weekends at the plus-size clothing store, the woman's parents told the newspaper.

She was released from the hospital and then spoke with investigators, according to the mother, who told the newspaper she has spoken to her daughter by phone. She added that she understood her daughter was the only witness.

Messages left at the couple's home in Kentucky and their daughter's home in Illinois were not immediately returned Monday.

Tinley Park police chief Mike O'Connell has said the investigation has been "extremely sensitive" and that "we need to keep ... information confidential."

Federal authorities said Monday they are assisting the Tinley Park department's search for the gunman.

"They have asked for our assistance, which we're providing," said Ross Rice, an FBI spokesman for the agency's Chicago office. He declined to detail the agency's involvement, including whether it is assisting the investigation, the manhunt or both.

The dead have been identified as: Connie R. Woolfolk, 37, of Flossmoor; Sarah T. Szafranski, 22, of Oak Forest; Carrie H. Chiuso, 33, of Frankfort; Rhoda McFarland, 42, of Joliet; and Jennifer L. Bishop, 34, of South Bend, Ind.

When 62-year-old Melvin Woolfolk heard that his daughter had been fatally shot at an attempted robbery at the store, he says his knees buckled.

"She was just a loving person who would help anybody. Nobody deserved what happened," he said of Connie Woolfolk, who worked for the village of Park Forest and as a real estate broker. Her father said she was devoted to her two sons, one of whom had severe leg deformities from birth and had undergone numerous operations.

Szafranski was a 2007 graduate of Northern Illinois University who was working as a paralegal, according to a Web site that appeared to be her Facebook page. Her family has said in a statement that, "Our emotions are raw. ... we are still in shock."

Carrie Chiuso was a social worker at Homewood-Flossmoor High School, where she graduated herself in 1993. Bishop was a nurse in the intensive care unit at Memorial Hospital of South Bend, hospital spokeswoman Ruth Linster said.

For two years, McFarland managed the Lane Bryant store. Her best friend, Sandra McGhee of Joliet, said she was a hopeful, prayerful woman who doted on her employees.

"Because I know her so well, I think to the end Rhoda might have even tried to talk to this man, tried to help him," McGhee said. "Even with her last breath, I believe she would have been forgiving him and trying to help him."

A $55,000 reward -- most of which is being paid for by Lane Bryant's parent company, Charming Shoppes, Inc. -- was being offered for information leading to the suspect's arrest.

Charming Shoppes spokeswoman Gayle Coolick said Monday she wasn't immediately sure how many employees were working during the robbery or how much cash was in the store at the time.

"But certainly it was early in the day so one would assume that cash levels were pretty low," she said.