Lane Bryant Shooting /// Part 1 /// 200 | Forensic Files

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oh [Music] police say a gunman shot and killed five women in a robbery at a women's clothing
store late Saturday morning the incident happened at this Lane Bryant southwest of Chicago the store is at a strip mall
called the Brookside Marketplace authorities say the store was open when the incident happened when police
arrived they found the victims in the back of the store the defender is described as a medium skinned male black
5'9 230 to 260 lb he was wearing a black waistlength winter coat a black knit cap
and dark jeans authorities haven't identified the victims but say they range in age from 22 to 37 they say four
were from suburban Chicago and one was from South Bend Indiana one resident says crime is a growing problem in the
area and needs to be beefed up and this could have been us and I just feel really
sorry for the people's family and the victims because you know this could have been this could have been prevented
police brought in a helicopter and dogs to search for the gunman but found no sign of him there was no security camera
inside the lamee Bryant store but police say they're trying to determine if the suspect was recorded by any cameras at
neighboring [Music] stores [Music] our true crime story this week is from a lovely place called Tinley Park Tinley
Park is a village located in Cook County Illinois it is one of the fastest growing suburbs south of Chicago this
horrific crime took place in 2008 but to give you a general idea of the location
Tinley Park Illinois in 2007 had no murders mhm and and only 15 robberies were reported in this Village the
population was just over 56,000 at the 2010 census and in 2009 Tinley Park was selected by Business Week a u very good
magazine as the best place to raise a family in America so the single best place in all of America Captain oh that
sounds pretty lovely in 2017 Tinley Park was listed as one of the 50 safest C cities in America did you know that um
the garage was voted number one place to do a podcast in the world and Parts Unknown was number two desired place to
live for the very low taxes that pay there that's we we pay you to live there yeah so while I feel very good about
those assessments being quite accurate you know that this is a safe place great place to raise a family this crime may
make you feel different but it is crimes like this that remind all of us that unfortunately these sort of things while
they can be rare they can happen anywhere anywhere laye Bryant is at the center of this case um and it's going to
be a Lane Bryant store in Tinley Park Lane Bryant is a store for the ladies uh according to their website Lane Bryant
is the most recognized name in plus-size clothing and their emphasis is on F fashion and fit not merely size well I
just want to point out the fact that in the Lululemon case they didn't sell to plus siiz and now Lane Bryant they're
known for plus sizes I don't think they sell to the petite ladies there a lot of
discrimination going on in in selling clothes both ways um but they Lane Bryant will tell you that their emphasis
on fashion and fit is what makes them a style leader so uh quick and interesting
story history here for uh Lane Bryant the company was founded way back in 1904 by Lena Bryant uh she made maternity
clothing mainly dresses I think Lena rented a stor front on fth Avenue the name Lane Bryant well the company got
that name because a bank officer misspelled Lena's name on the paperwork the business opened its first Branch
store in Chicago in 1915 so Lane Bryant has has been deep rooted in the Chicago area for a long time as of 2013 the
chain consisted of 8812 stores in 46 US states only Alaska Hawaii Montana and Wyoming at that time did not have Lane
Bryant stores in 2010 Lane Bryant accused Fox and ABC of censoring their 30second ad spot during commercial
breaks for the D ING with the Stars in American Idol TV shows the ads featured plus-size model Ashley Graham in their
line of lingerie lame Bryant accused the networks of discrimination because stating that the networks had no problem
airing Victoria's Secret advertisements with similar similarly clad models in the same time slots I'm a lover of all
women of all sizes just putting that out there hey I'm a lover of Ashley Graham um so all right Lane Bryant store
this particular Lane Bryant store that we are discussing today is located in the Great Village of Tinley Park at the
Brookside Marketplace which was built in 2005 Lan Bryant there were there were probably what about six or seven Lane
Bryant stores in the Greater Columbus area around us somewhere I don't know I never go shopping but it's pretty much
like a big box store right yeah so smaller than Target but still a decent Siz store yeah you normally find him in
a mall or a strip mall so this particular one is a 23,000 Square ft store now back in 2008 Brookside
Marketplace included some storefronts that were not open yet this making the Lane Bryant store more is isolated MH
the strip mall skirts a major section of Interstate 80 uh the belt of America and
it also has a holiday in and a sleep in nearby so hotels nearby hotel motel holiday in no houses are in immediate in
the immediate area and a few apartment buildings are about a half a mile away okay so this brings us Captain to
Saturday February 2nd 2008 which was a very cold day the ground was frozen and snow covered yeah it was actually the
day before the Super Bowl yes it was Captain we have uh 42 year-old Roa McFarland she went to work on this
Saturday but she was not scheduled to work uh she was the store manager at the Lane Bryant store now she knew that her
employees would be stretched on that Saturday after the corporate office mailed customers Flyers promoting a big
$9.99 clearance sale now I'm not I don't know much about the Lane Bryant store but from what I understand it's some of
the items can be more expensive and so this is is a pretty good deal for everybody this will draw in the
customers on a on a busy Saturday everybody's going to line up to get some good deals did you say 9.99 that's right
so rather than she's a she's a team player uh this store manager Rota she rather than force her staff to go to
loan she decides to pitch in and go in that day now the Lane Bryant store opened its doors for business at 10:00
a.m. the crime began to unfold shortly after at 10 8 a man entered the store and engaged the clerk asking her
questions about a delivery he carried with him some type of papers that he stated were related to the delivery that
he was attempting to make at this store now this man was wearing a dark colored below the waistlength winter coat as he
entered the Lane Bryant store it is reported that he looked toward the ceiling and this is believed that he was
looking for for cameras he chatted briefly with Roa McFarland the store manager he also talked to another person
that we will refer to as the witness uh we don't use her real name we don't know
her real name but she is called Martha and we're not using her name because the police don't use her name right she's
only referred to as Martha so that's what we we will have to call her here so the man spoke to both of these ladies
regarding this delivery well this this was a ruse um he was not there to make some kind of delivery this was used to
engage somebody with inside the store I'm a little confused why he would use this as some kind of tactic but we're
going to see where it goes from there okay so Roa the manager she decides to try to help out so she calls another
store location to see if there was some kind of mixup with the delivery because she's telling the guy we don't have any
delivery scheduled right so so maybe this delivery was supposed to go to another
store anyway during this time two customers entered the store it is at this time the police would later say
that the man then pulled out a gun and announced a holdup he forced the four women into the back room this was a
small employee ba break room he forced the women to tape each other's hands and then he bound the remaining women uh or
woman himself after binding them he told them to lay face down on the floor then
two more women who who later entered the store they were also taken to the back room they were bound and placed next to
the others now the order so we have four customers at this time right everybody's
been taken hostage the order of which the customers came in is unknown it is known that Connie woolfork
uh was a fighter and at some point during this holdup she had a physical altercation with the suspect she was
struck in the face with what is believed to have been the butt of the gun that the man had brought with him she also
had blood under her fingernails which is believed to have come from the suspect so she fought this guy at some point
right this man also took some of the stores's clothing and placed it over the heads of some of the women now I want to
be clear here on this statement because I've this has been reported multiple ways from multiple
sources and several of the sources suggest that all of the women had their heads covered with with clothing items
some suggest that it was just a few of the women um and also one report a couple reports state that women's
panties were used to cover their heads now while this might not seem important I think that it is somewhat important
because we are going to be relying on some witness statements to have conclusions and thoughts about this
suspect and we will have to use our own opinions to determine how much weight to
apply to those witness statements later so apparently one of the victims um one of the ladies that was bound was the was
a target of sexual advances by the suspect during the time that he had them taken hostage it is stated that was
fondled there was that's that's not sexual advances that's that's assault right sexual assault I I I apologize I'm
reporting it as it as it was well whoever reported it as a tool bag um there there were no further sexual
content or contact from suspect to any of the other victims beyond that point now store manager Rota McFarland somehow
she managed to call 911 she had her cell phone Bluetooth yeah she calls 911 at 10:44 a.m. and I
want everybody to kind of Mark that time in their in their heads here because remember we're saying that the man
entered the store at approximately 10:08 so he's been in the store for quite some time all right 10:08 he
enters at 10:44 there's a 911 call and he's still in the store at this time now Roa she managed to to make this call
while the gunman was distracted mhm even though she was bound with tape on the call which is posted on the Tinley Park
Police website um so very very brave Roa McFarland calls to notify 911 of the robbery in progress the the 911
dispatcher picks up and at this point Rus says Lane Bryant she Whispers it to the uh dispatcher and the dispatcher ask
where at and she states Tinley Park please hurry let's take a listen of that that 911 call 911
emergency we at stay on the line stay on the line let me get you to Tinley Park don't hang
up it is believed that the suspect heard the dispatchers voice over Roa McFarland's Bluetooth the police were
dispatched a Tinley Park police officer was in an adjacent parking lot at the time of the 911 call it is approx
estimated that he was about 20 I'm sorry 200 yard away mhm so police arrived on the scene very quickly and it is
reported that the first officer arrived only about 2 minutes after the short 911
call now the the witness that we are calling Martha she has stated that she believes she heard police sirens before
the shooting started so this is at approximately 10:46 a.m. so all six women at this point at 10:46 a.m. were
shot execution style Roa McFarland was the only one shot in the forehead the rest in the back of their heads the man
then walked out the front door and disappeared five of the ladies were dead when police arrived and as we said only
a couple minutes from the beginning of McFarland's 911 call one woman survived this is who are we are we are call
calling Martha right she too had been shot and left for dead but she tricked the Killer by moving her head at the
last second causing a severe graze in her neck she then pretended to be dead until police arrived a black SUV as well
as a black sedan were seen on video leaving the Lane Bryant parking lot at approximately 10:48 a.m. so all of this
happened within a time span of about 40 minutes the suspect arrives at the Lane Bryant store at approximately 10:08 mhm
the call to 911 is placed at 10:44 shots are fired at approximately 10:46 and the
suspect left the scene at approximately [Music] 10:48 this show is sponsored by better
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[Music] 2023 all right we're back newspapers went to the the doorsteps in news stands
the following morning the Sunday Chicago Tribune LED with the headline five women
slain in store police hunt gunman and shooting at Tinley Park Mall the article reads A gunman LED women into the back
of a clothing store Saturday morning killed them then walked out the front door and disappeared police said there
were no survivors at the Lane Bryant store in a Suburban strip mall along Interstate Highway 80 and what they are
calling calling a botched robbery still with little information made public conflicting reports and rumors about
motives and Witnesses swirled throughout the day yeah officers from at least eight local departments quickly
descended on the shopping center some went from door too combing stores for Clues others hunted in a nearby
subdivision for a stocky man described by one witness while helicopters hovered in the sky one Helicopter Armed with an
infrared camera scanned snow covered open land and forest preserves police pleaded for help from anyone with
information on the killing spree as night fell the gunman remained on the Loose timley Park police chief Michael
o' Connell tried to calm fear saying we are very confident that the offender is out of the area but earlier in the day
an officer at the scene admitted we have no idea who he is the gunman was still at large late Saturday do they have any
evidence of what he took or did he take anything let's get into that but I want to kind of clarify some things I found
that that article to be very interesting this is what the the locals are hearing
these are the reports they're hearing and reading just the day after and I thought we should comb through that
because there's one very important detail here and that is that the the police are stating that there no
survivors that five women were taken hostage they were all shot and killed before the man left the store the reason
for this this is not any confusion on anyone's part this is simply to protect the living witness they did not want the
offender to be aware that there was a Survivor right they didn't want this person to know that there is still a
person alive from the scene that could identify them and that he might I mean we have to keep this in mind whether he
went into the store with intending to kill anyone at all we don't know right but at the end of the day what he did do
what this person did do is murder five people very capable of looking for this woman finding her and killing her we
wouldn't even know at this point in the investigation if he would have known who
she was yeah I mean there could be ties from the suspect to one or more of the victims or I mean is she being kept in a
hospital for observation for days on end you know we've we've all seen the the mob movies where there's somebody that
survived something and they're a living witness and they got to put put the police officers by their door because we
could get some mobster dude coming in the middle of the night and take this person out but on the other side of
things you could say there was a Survivor and if this was just a robbery that went bad in this person's snap that
could force the hand of this individual to turn himself in mhm like oh somebody survived I'm going to get caught let me
turn myself in well let's take a look real quick captain at the key players in this whole crime let's talk about some
let's talk about the victims as well as what they may know about the suspect so there were five women killed one wounded
uh she was treated that you know the wounded one would go on to be known as Martha she would be treated at St James
Hospital in Olympia Fields and she was released on Sunday so she was in the hospital for approximately 24 hours
right uh currently it's my understanding that this living witness uh is living out of the area now um but she stays in
close phone contact with police investigators and she's been extremely cooperative and she is there for them
whenever they need to ask questions of her so one of the victims that we've already mentioned by name was Roa
McFarland mhm age 42 she was the manager of the Lane Bryant store in Tinley Park
she had been there for two years she was a US Air Force veteran uh she worked as
a nurse at Andrews Air Force Base Roa served as an associate pastor at Embassy Christian Center she began working at
Lane Bryant after her Crest Hill Church had closed she started a program at her church
called Princess this program teaches girls proper etiquette and guides them to help them grow to be young productive
women she was planning on expanding this program and expanding it to other churches um in in the area as well in
other areas as well right she went to work that Saturday was but was not scheduled to work as we had already said
now Roa was engaged over the holidays of 20 2007 to a man named Stuart Gibbs she
continued to answer her Christian calling at the Lane Bryant store often often using her employee discount to buy
clothes for people who are less fortunate she is the only victim that was shot in the forehead this is
believed that the Killer caught her on the phone talking to 911 and when he confronted her that's when he shot her
in the forehead and another one of the victims is Jenny Lynn Bishop yeah Jenny was 30 before at the time of this crime
she was from South Bend and she was a customer at the Lane Bryant she was married to Brian Bishop and they had
three young children she graduated from Indiana University with a Bachelor of Science and nursing in
1996 she had been employed by Memorial hospital since 1995 she worked in the Intensive Care Unit fellow nurses
described her as a compassionate caring knowledgeable and efficient worker well she's a nurse so you know she was a
badass relatives of Jenny Bishop believe that she may have gone to the Lyn Bryant
store that day to cash in a birthday gift card yeah the lane Brant yeah she had celebrated her 34th birthday just 5
days prior to the crime her husband was in the area for business and she was out
while he was working our next victim is Sarah zansky she's 22 years old at the time the crime from Oak Forest she was a
customer as well the future looked promising for Sarah because in May of 2007 she had graduated from Northern
Illinois University with a degree in finance and had a job already lined up at CNA Financial Corp and this is in
Chicago she went to the Lane Bryant store that day because she needed work clothes for her first postc col job
right now later after life a a park bench in o Force Bears her name she was the youngest of the five murdered
victims just 22 years old now scholarships were also awarded in her name Connie woolfork uh was one that we
had mentioned by name as well she was 37 at the time of Flossmore she was a customer as well at the store that day
she was a single mother of two sons ages 16 and 10 her youngest child suffers from spinabifida and requires much of
his mother's time and attention for seven years she served the village of Park Forest in a variety of positions
working in the finance and Community Development departments she left her job with the village in December of 2006
this to pursue a Family Mortgage business with her mother Connie worked as a mortgage lender lived with her
mother and two sons to help make ends meet in the troubled housing market she took a second job stocking shelves
overnight at the Super Target in the same Tinley Park Shopping Center she was treating herself to a manicure and
pedicure on that Saturday and some shopping at Lane Bryant to buy a new outfit when she didn't show up for a
scheduled meeting with a client at 2: p.m. her family grew increasingly worried her family said that she was a
fighter and would not have gone along without a fight it is reported that she had bruising and blood under her
fingernails that might have been from the suspect the bruising as we said is thought to be from being struck in the
head with the gun we also have Carrie chusu she's 33 years old of Frankfurt she was a customer Carrie was a social
worker at her school um Homewood Flossmore high school that my friends social worker at a high school is an
extremely tough and difficult job I don't know this particular high school but I know two ladies that work in these
very same capacities and let me tell you friends that is no walk in the park now
Carrie and her husband married a year and a half before the murders her husband was waiting for her to return
home from a quick shopping trip to the Lane Bryant clothing store when he saw the news reports on TV and he actually
recognized her car parked in front of the store on the news coverage you want to talk about a sick feeling
yeah after Tony saw his wife's car in the news reports he left their home and he went to the Tinley Park police
station there he was what he was suspecting was confirmed that she was one of the victims now the day after
Carrie died her brother's wife went into labor uh they had a little girl who they
named they named her carry M uh car's current and former students packed into the what ended up being a 7-hour wake
for Carrie in in Memorial of her life Martha as we said not her real name she was the surviving victim she was 30 she
was 33 years old at the time a part-time employee at the Lane Bryant store she was shot along with the rest but the
bullet went into her neck missing vital organs she was enrolled in nursing school and working two jobs to make ends
meet recently divorced she stated that she had heard the police sirens prior to the shooting started so what do we know
about the suspect well the killer was not wearing a mask or disguise he was described as 6 foot tall and I I do want
to kind of add to that though a little bit because I've read and watched news reports yeah that will state that he
could have been as short as I believe 5'9 yeah um or short for a male or he could have been as tall as
6'2 now I want to throw this in there though the overwhelming majority of these stories say that the man was 6
foot tall that he was approximately 6 foot tall yeah but don't they also say he was stocky yeah so he it's an he's an
African-American male of average weight um he the police have described him as stocky but also average weight see that
doesn't make any sense sense to me well they state that they believe he's between 2 and 220 lb right but at 6'
tall I wouldn't call somebody stocky he's also described as a medium to dark skin tone with braided hair with three
to five poofy cornrows pulled toward the back of his head one braid hung down the right cheek
and had four light green beads on the end this man is is believed to have been between the ages of 25 and 35 years old
at the time of the murders now the suspect this is where we might have a little issue with his weight Captain the
suspect was wearing a dark colored waistlength jacket or coat right now we did say it was very cold that day the
ground was frozen snow covered depending on the the the poofiness or the bulk of
this coat that could change the perception of his weight yeah my jacket makes me look a little fluffy there are
some reports out there that state that he was seen having a roll of duct tape in one of the pockets of this coat mhm
the suspect was also wearing black jeans with an embroidery on the back pocket similar to a cursive G now one
possibility here Captain is that he was wearing gunit clothing the gunit clothing company was established in 2003
this is because of 50 Cent and you know he teamed up with Mark Echo to create this line of clothing and accessories
inspired by 50 Cent and fellow G Unit members these jeans have a cursive G on the pocket right so possibly wearing
this line of clothing now the suspect was also wearing a charcoal gray or dark ski skull cap on his head a couple of
websites mentioned that he had possibly left behind a b baseball hat at the scene of the crime the Survivor said the
killer may have had professionally manicured fingernails this is only mentioned once so you know I I I
actually hesitated to even put this in the report but on airing on the side of full disclosure throw it in there and
and let people make what they want of it now police have released a composite sketch based on the witness's
description the weapon that he used is a Smith and Wesson Glock the gunman took a few hundred according to police there
were two vehicles seen leaving the area shortly after the shooting this was a black SUV and a black sedan now police
have said that they have fingernail clippings remember we said that one of the victims had it's believed that she
had blood underneath her fingernails remember we also stated that the man came in with papers that are
supposed to be part of this delivery that he was making uh maybe instructions or some type of invoice something like
that uh it's believed that the police have these papers that he left them at the scene of the crime possibly touch
DNA on those correct correct so that's what we know for certain on the suspect do you think this is just a robbery turn
murder well that seems to be the strongest Theory or motive that's out there because this is a very strange
crime Captain when you when you really think of this implicity of it where you have so many people being killed so many
murdered victims and yet you have almost a robbery situation that doesn't make a
lot of sense when you look at it and I know that there are probably details of this crime that are have just not been
made public and therefore we are only working with part of the story but yes I would say that probably the strongest or
most popular Theory regarding this crime out there is that the thought is it was
a simple robbery that turned violent um so a botched robbery in which the offender made off with very little cash
in the course of the robbery he figures out that one of the ladies had called 911 and he panics and shoots all of them
yeah within a couple minutes yeah and what I mean I understand that this is the most likely Theory but you're
robbing a store at the beginning of the workday the store opens at 10:00 you enter the store at 80 or 10:08 sorry you
know you're out of the store within 45 minutes you take a couple hundred dollars I
mean you're going to rob a store where most people understand that there's a night drop done for all these stores and
a lot of these stores especially like a lane giant these are credit card based stores and and now most stores don't
carry a lot of cash on them so you see what I'm saying like it's no no no I I follow you and that's
why I feel like this is a crime that doesn't make a lot of sense right and and and and here's where I go with that
my thought is that I what I can see from what we know from the living Witnesses statements right is that we are probably
working and talking about a very unorganized offender here and I see where this guy may have had some type of
plan whether whether it all makes sense to us may not be the case right we don't
know what kind of Rhyme or Reason this dude's working with first of all and then second of all it appears to me like
he lost control of the situation fairly quickly and when things weren't going his
way he's not intelligent enough to work through the problem to problem solve on the spot in the end his only result the
only thing he can come up with is to kill everybody and leave um so so let's let's go through this first Theory here
okay because you bring up some good points so if this was to be a robbery why would somebody choose a store like
Lane Bryant or any kind of clothing store at all to Rob Early on a Saturday right so I my first thought there would
be that we have a guy that is looking for what he would would perceive to be a soft target an easy target yeah chances
are the employees are going to be female chances are the customers are going to be female and by choosing early morning
hours you may have less people in the store to have to deal with yeah because we as we mentioned this is a 23,000 fot
store it could be tough it could be tough to Corral everybody and manage the scene just given the space of this place
I mean people can hide fairly easily in a 23,000 ft building but that also might
be to your point that the suspect is not thinking things clearly and so he's going to rob a place that one is not
going to have a lot of cash on it and it's a big building hhm now when we say that a soft target that that uh
potential victims or people being in the store would all be female or most likely
to be female let's be clear here we're using we're trying to use the criminals thought process here trying to use the
suspect's thought process here and we don't know that for certainty but the guess would be that that may have put
some kind of put him at ease in some way that there was a reason for picking this
particular store that is really the only thing that stands out to me or is could
it be that this man believes that okay they're they're not selling lowline stuff right you know maybe there's some
more money in this store than would be in some of the other stores because they're you know more expensive items
right so a soft target 2 should be secluded in some way um from from busy areas and we know the Lane Bryant store
was away from the rest of the businesses and it's in a strip mall that was not fully rented out at the time yeah also
an easy target should have an easy Escape Route the Lane Bryant is just minutes from Interstate 80 this is a
huge uh freeway that that starts in New Jersey and ends in California we had mentioned that the timing is a little
weird um but for the sake of wanting an easy target the timing is great so he walks into the store that just opened
its doors 8 minutes prior less likely to encounter a large number of customers but if it's the money that you're after
Why not pick a bank or a gas station right yeah well we have the the surviving witness's account the killer
according to her the killer walked in and was a looking up at the ceiling and it's believed he was possibly looking
for cameras now my thought here is that this man knows that Banks and gas stations because of their high
probability of getting robbed will be outfitted with cameras yeah multiple cameras so when he went into the
store he has he's technically committed zero infractions against the law at this
point point right so if he walks in and he's never been in this store before and
he's looking up and he sees cameras he can simply just turn around and walk out and go pick another Target at this time
well he is wearing gunit pants so I think that is a crime um there's there are some
drawbacks to this Theory and you've mentioned a couple of them Captain but I kind of want to go through my laundry
list here so we don't leave any out as long as it doesn't include any gunit pants I'm okay with your laundry list so
as you mentioned how much money would there be in a register that that's you know they just opened up the store 8
minutes prior okay um I don't know well here's the other thing too in a couple of accounts they state that the
guy may have robbed the women too uhhuh so most of the material out there does not State this but this could this could
be possible maybe even likely you know he had the ladies bound and if he fell in control of the situation he gets the
cash from the register and from the office and finds out it's not that much money he decides to rob the ladies as
well I mean as well yes it's it's it's reminiscent of that conversation in the diner scene in Pulp Fiction when the
couple is getting ready to rob the diner and they're talking about what their plan is and their last Heist and they
say that they both agree that it was a good idea that they robbed both the business and customers in the last Heist
because they they doubled their take yeah but again not very well thought out cuz how many people are
carrying cash well I'm just stating this could be a possibility After he finds out he's not got much money at this
point I agree so and and keep in mind the killer was in the store for approximately 40 minutes this gives him
enough time to rob the ladies as well now I do Wonder here one thing that I one thing that I wish that we had here
is a lot more information I think there was probably a lot of stuff that went down in that store over the course of
the 40 minutes what at what time did he draw his gun is a big question for me I would love to know what time the store
manager called the other store to inquire about the delivery that he was pretending to do M so let's say that
this theory is right that this is correct this would lead me to leave and I'm sure that the police have looked
into this and I if not I don't understand why they wouldn't have but um then we need to get new police officers
yeah my thought would be just food for thought here Captain potentially this guy might have some experience in doing
this and what I mean by this is maybe the plan doesn't seem so bad when you work it over the course of
many different stores I mean it only didn't work out in this situation is what I'm getting at because here's the
thought the suspect may have hit what he perceives to be soft targets before and
he's hitting them early in the morning for a good reason maybe he's only looking to get a few hundred let's say
$200 whatever is in the register right now why would he do this the thought is that he would bring he brings a gun into
the store with him but probably most of the time he never even needs to draw the
weapon to make the threat he just goes up threatens the person at the register or speaks to somebody in the store tells
them it's going to be a robbery and he makes off with $200 now keep in mind if he doesn't pull a gun a $200 unarmed
robbery will go away pretty fast in most police jurisdictions M well and if you did this at the bank it's a federal
offense second of all if you if you mention that there's a gun mhm then it's arm robbery so it doesn't matter if you
show your gun or not right an implied threat of a firearm is the same as having a fire chances are that these
registers are not going to have bait money or die packs that's what a bank would have you know the die packs are
normally within like a football field or so they just blow up MH and they turn everything blue they Smurf your ass um
so yes I agree that this plan doesn't seem so dumb except for the fact that you're going into a store showing your
face and yes less likely that there's going to be there's going to be less cameras than a bank but there's still
going to be cameras but now you have all these eyewitnesses that see your face so
I still think it's a really horrible plan but I I think that he manages to get out of the store and there are no
cameras to take footage of him well we have cameras seeing cars leave right those are from another store right so
all right let's get into let's go to Theory two real quick all right this is a very similar theory in the sense that
it's robbery but possibly an inside job meaning our offender the killer had inside help maybe an assistant manager
or former manager or former employee correct right so I'll break this down real quick Inside Job meaning that this
robbery was set up with the help of a current employee or former employee of this particular Lane Bryant store or
maybe even another Lane Bryant store these would be the only so one thing that I'm curious about here with the
money we know that a few I'll call you whiskers a few hundred was taken in this robbery I would love to know did this
come from the safe did it come from the register did it come from a combination of both also robbing the the uh
customers as well where did this money come from because one thing here is that current managers current assistant
managers or previous managers and assistant managers are likely to be the only people with the safe combination so
if money was taken from the safe he accessed that safe in some form or fashion whether it be through the
employees that were at the Lane Bryant that day or he walked in there with prior knowledge of the store right now
where I worked before there was a safe but all it had was the two drawers that we used so so there was no extra funds
it was just whatever's in those drawers mhm so again if even if you just got the
one drawer and then you open up the safe so I can get the next drawer I would one
assume that he would get more than a few hundred doar if he could get to both drawers so again that would be
information that I don't know if it would help the investigation but again I mean this crime is now 10 years old I
think at some point try to get the public involved I mean that's one of the reasons why we're covering the case to
shine some light on it and get people talking about this so if this in fact were the correct Theory here uh the
correct motive let this is kind of how I see it it playing out okay so the inside
person the accomplice that this man had that this killer had failed to show up to the store for whatever reason that
day you know the inside accomplice got cold feed or whatever decided not to show this leaving the suspect stuck with
six women who he thought could identify him he walks in there without any type of Disguise maybe he doesn't he doesn't
Discover that his helper that his accomplice is not there until after he's drawn the gun and already told everybody
that there's going to be a holdup so as the suspect is is waiting he had to control the workers and the customers
and as time went on at the scene he starts to lose control of the scene and once he hears the 911 operator on
McFarland's phone he knew that the robbery was a total bust except for the register money and then the suspect
hears the sirens in the distance and in a moment of anger or Panic or both he killed the women and fled the scene mhm
I I think this could be a strong Theory the only reason why I I really question the weight of this theory is like what
you for what you just said 10 years has passed okay and this theory is easily investigated and we know from detectives
that we know here in Columbus and in the Greater Columbus area that this is often
the theory that they look at first when they start looking into these crimes can
we tie anybody that's working there previous employees to this criminal act whether it just be the theft robbery or
what went down here so in exploring this possibility here's some more information and this is
what I was able to gather from an assistant manager of a Lane Bryant store and it it is a stating this person told
me that it is store policy it was then and is currently store policy to have a manager or an assistant manager open the
store along with a regular employee right which we kind of learn from the Lululemon case it is also a policy to
drop off the previous day's Pro seeds at the bank in the morning before the store
opened so this has been one thing that's highly contested so I all I can go off of is what this person told me I've
never worked a day in my life at Lane Bryant you haven't worked a day in your life I filled out two applications they
didn't even call me for an interview or anything for Lane Bryant yeah oh I'm I'm
joking oh I was going to say it's cuz you have a fascination with their spokes models so just to be clear on that all
the money taken in the day before is then counted the next morning and dropped off at the bank before they open
for business on that day pretty clear yeah so if you get there early enough you get the drop according to this
person the assistant manager and the manager are the only two that had the safe combination so if like you said if
this person could have got to the store before they open their doors there's a chance at that time the safe would have
been open money is out and being counted by each employee um and during this time
once the money's counted they sign off on it and here's my thought any chance this guy didn't do much homework and
thought the store was opening at 11: because that's where that's where you start to wonder about the delivery he
seems to have a ruse to want to get in the store now you don't need a ruse to get into the store and assess the
situation when the doors are open anybody can just walk in just go in and act like you're shopping yeah yeah but
this guy had uh what he a fake delivery that he was planning on doing yeah but I
think to me the the fake delivery is more of a setup to for him to get into the building and for him to be looking
around and kind of case casing the joint with this ruse and also I think with this Insider job idea right that it's an
Insider job I also think that there's a lot of there's High turnover rate in these retail stores and you're talking
about normally a lot of different ages you know when I worked at Pon there was a lot of people uh in their late teens
early 20s and then you had other people in their mid-30s so you got this pretty decent r range and it could have just
been somebody drinking at a party saying well I used to work there and blah blah
blah you see what I'm saying I get you and in telling about the workings of of the store right you or this guy dated
some girl that worked at Lane Bryant two years ago I mean he could have some kind
of insid or knowledge on some different level well where the this is where I have a big issue with this whole story
is that we have if if he in fact had Insider knowledge of the intricate workings of the lame Bryant store or if
he was working with an accomplice remember we were stating that according to this person that we spoke to that the
money is counted in the morning and then taken to the bank that day and this is done by an assistant manager or a
manager and the store is opened by a manager or assistant manager and another employee right the the thing that I have
a big question mark on here is and it makes this whole thing very curious ious to me is that Roa McFarland the store
manager she was not it's general knowledge that she was not scheduled to work that day and according to newspaper
accounts she was ends up being the only manager that we can get the name of of being in the store that day right so
what could have happened though is that a manager gets sick assistant manager somebody gets sick something
happens they have to call off work and she had to come in of course I I understand how that works I'm saying
what makes it weird is that either that's just a coincidence or this happened on this day for a reason right
and so the questions here are some some questions that were likely asked by the investigators and hopefully they receive
satisfactory answers to help clear suspects or potential suspects in this case so one was there an assistant
manager scheduled to work work on the morning of February 2nd 2008 and if so where was he or she and what was the
reason for them not being at the store two did the money from the previous day get dropped at the bank on the day of
the shooting if so did the bank have any cameras that they could see if the people making the money drop or followed
to or from the bank yeah number three could an ex employee or an assistant manager have promised a large payout
from a safe and then changed their mind and failed to show up to assist this offender yeah next question I would have
would be have Lane Bryant employees or ex-employees U from other locations been investigated thought here too a little
bit going deeper into this going back a little bit the Lane Bryant store was open this particular store was open
prior to Roa McFarland having taken over as a manager so who was the prior manager and was the combination to the
safe changed when management changed yeah sometimes those safes just change randomly yeah and who and who's in
charge of save changing the safe combination is that something that they send somebody in from corporate to do
that or is that just going making a phone call and stating well now you have to change the combination here's the old
one um you know is that left up to that particular store what's the protocol on that and then here's another question
that I would have regarding the safe combination are the safe combinations different per location or are they
similar enough to figure out a different stores combination now that seems like a
weird question right no there most of these but it doesn't does it when people who have worked retail or worked where
there are safes especially in franchises or chains they understand that that question is not that strange of a of a
thought right I think it's strange the reason why is because most of those people hire security companies to help
them do this stuff so the security companies are not going to have branches in similar locations to have
combinations that are even remotely close that's my guess I mean and that's just from my experience with Banking and
how many times we had to change combinations to everything to the main Vault to the teller Vault to individual
vaults on our teller stations and in the back room and so I'm guessing that Lane
Bryant being such a big store what do you say 800 and some stores yeah 800 some stores as of 2013 they're going to
have some security company that's kind of monitoring all that stuff they're going to pay somebody to to monitor or
that I agree I could be wrong I agree but let me throw this at you and and I know you're speaking on experience but
you're speaking from your experience having worked in a bank now I know you worked retail at some point as well I
don't know if you had any Insider knowledge of how they did the the safes there at the retail what I was
telling you at the well I think it was just a key but I was telling you during the break I I believe our safe uh at Pon
you could have just picked up and walked out with like it wasn't like I don't even think it was attached to a wall or
anything because a strong person could carry it out of the store yeah and this would have been 2001 when I worked there
so we're talking about a long time ago there was there was barely any Cash ever in that store if somebody when it came
in to Rob us it's like here's your couple hundred bucks have a nice day I worked retail very briefly and I was
such a low-level employee I had no knowledge of anything I I went in there and worked for fun twice a week
basically um I worked for fun well I mean they paid me but it was just kind of a a fun job that I took but however I
did work as a uh manager at a gas station and a manager at a pizza shop now we had pretty at both places we had
pretty Loosey Goosey rules as far as how we conducted business I will say this at
at the yeah but this was what 1976 no no no no it would have been like 99 2000 so I will say this the one the
gas station that I worked for is a major chain I'm not going to say what n what the brand is because I don't want people
to know this well we don't want people looking down on that brand for hiring you at the location that I worked we had
a four-digit combination to the safe mhm and the reason why I posed this question
of could an employee of another store have some general knowledge of how this store works and I don't think that's
farfetch even as much so as a possible combination idea for the safe and I bring this up because of my experience
there so our we had a store number a four-digit store number which is not easily known to the general public it
had nothing to do with our street address it wasn't posted anywhere on the outside of the store on the inside of
the store it was something that usually only the managers would know uh most of the employees were unaware of our store
number however I will say this and and I only know this and maybe it didn't work
this way at every location but at the time that I worked at this gas station our combination our four-digit
combination to safe was the store number that's stupid well no it is stupid it it it's very stupid but it's
also not it's not crazy it's not out of the realm of possibility that this type of thing was going on on other places MH
um but again all we have to know is how much money did he get and I'm sure that the law enforcement is well aware of
where he got the money from who we got the money from so this is a question that they could obviously answer Captain
before we move on to I have a a bit of an outside the box Theory here but before we move out of talking about
robbery that turned into a got turned violent and turned into murder right there's another theory out there that's
that I find to be very interesting and the theory is to simplify it is an out of town offender me meets an outof Town
murdered witness and what I mean by that is remember we mentioned earlier that Jenny Bishop she was from out of town
she was in town with her husband that was there on work M and Jenny was going shopping while her husband was out
working that day mhm is there is there a chance and this is just food for thought
that the offender that the the man that went into Rob the Lane Bryant store could he have been staying at one of
those local hotels where she was staying and they they had seen each other prior
to the robbery he gets in in there in the back room and now he's got a customer that he recognizes her face he
doesn't know her name but if he recognizes her as having stayed at the same hotel as he had the night before he
would probably assume that she might be able to say hey that guy that took off with the money out of here he was
staying at the blah blah blah hotel last night possibly I I I do believe that the
suspect was triggered by the 911 call because once that call happened you know five murders within minutes yeah that's
when the shooting starts so I I find this Theory intriguing and and I find it to be very interesting and it makes me
kind of think about other possibilities here I would believe that that a lot of time was spent investigating those local
hotels you know most of the time people they keep records of license plates Vehicles you normally need a credit card
to rent credit card ID all those sort of things not that this individual couldn't
have stolen you know couldn't have put together materials to travel um and use somebody else's funds or vehicle for
that one of the theories here is that this was not a robbery at all that this was kind of is kind of staged to be a
robbery but in sense there was there was a murder that was actually going to happen and the thought on this is Roa
McFarland she would be at the center of this Theory because for several years Roa had been deeply involved with the
embassy Christian Center which is a now defunct Church in Crest Hill Illinois she began as an administrative assistant
to the pastor George AI Jr and soon became one of his most trusted colleagues she was ordained as a
minister and had become an associate pastor at the church and she was even counseling girls remember we said she
set up that Princess program at some point Roa began to feel uncomfortable with some of ai's financial decisions
it's unclear of what if any wrongdoing transpired and whether Roda dis Comfort was solely over finances or if it
included something more personal that she had uncovered so a bad relationship happens between these two
now around the same time the church's membership went from 1,000 people to 75 by the time of 2006 and this is when Roa
decides to leave yes just looking looking on the outside in when you see dras numbers like that drop you
assume you kind of assume something weird is going on there right yeah well it sounds to me that he was making some
weird decisions this got out to uh his the the members of the church most of the members of the church probably
thought it was shady or or not a part of their belief systems and they left M well Aji he moved with his family and
several church members to Austin Texas and this was to start a new church um Embassy Nation Network which now appears
to be closed as well well the only problem with this theory for me is that Rona wasn't scheduled to work that day
yeah no I I get what you're saying but I want to kind of go into this in a little
more depth here because this was something that the police investigated and even though they've been very tight
lipped about it one intriguing clue that the investigators uncovered is a 20-minute phone phone call placed by a
former Embassy member now this took place about an hour before the murders and it was routed through the tower the
cell phone tower nearest the Lane Bryant store apparently this was enough to Peak
the task force interest because in Late July of the year of the murders nearly a
dozen detectives from the major crimes task force traveled to Texas to interview former church members and
Associates of Roda including a ji and now apparently at this time he was living in some big mansion up in the
hills and uh somewhere in Texas when they tracked him down now right so you go from a thousand members to
75 and then you go to Texas and you close down another church but you're still living in a mansion mhm H well
interesting how that works AI has publicly and forcefully rejected any notion that his church is linked to the
homicides and investigators have continually said that um currently that they have no suspects so but but it's an
intriguing connection the Texas conect connection for several reasons and one is the day before the murders there was
a San Antonio news site this is W ai.com ran a story about a sex scandal involving a pastor named Rick Hawkins
Hawkins is alleged to have used church funds to silence women either because he had had affairs with them or he has
sexually harassed them now a poster on that site using the name for what's right left the following comment under
the Hawkins story for what's right February 1st 2008 posted well someone should check out George AI in Austin
Texas formerly of Illinois he has ties with Hawkins and has been suspected of doing the same thing the name of his
church is Embassy Nation Church formerly Embassy Christian Center records show for what's right registered on that day
and posted on that day and never commented again there are some out there that believe that this for what's right
could actually have been Roa McFarland so I here's the thing Captain that's an interesting them it's an
interesting thought very interesting one that we shouldn't completely rule out here that that maybe somebody was sent
to kill Roa or one of these other people now regarding this particular Theory there is the cell phone tower
information but really nothing much else right um so while it sounds like a very
juicy lead impossible Theory keep in mind the police did investigate this and currently today they are stating that
while through the course of 10 years they have had what they thought to be many good suspects as we sit here today
they are telling us they have no suspects so having investigated this telling us they have no suspects it
seems like it's been thoroughly investigated and possibly no connection but I do want to mention this before we
conclude today another possible Texas connection is that America's Most Wanted our the great TV show right they covered
this case when it was fresh well after doing a segment on the Lane Bryant case they concluded that the killer
sounded like he had some type of southern [Music] accent if you'd like to help shine some
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Lane Bryant Shooting /// Part 1 /// 200

Part 1 of 2

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10 years ago a man walked into a Lane Bryant clothing store posing as a delivery man. He announced a holdup and began taking women to a back room where they were bound with tape. One of the brave ladies managed to call 911. The robbery escalated and turned very violent. Before fleeing he shot all six ladies. Despite police arriving on the scene within minutes of the 911 call the killer managed to get away. Police have spent millions of dollars trying to catch this man. Was this a robbery gone very bad or are there bigger motives at play? Beer of the Week - Grinderpunch by Soundgrowler Brewing Garage Grade - 4 out of 5 bottle caps

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Brief Summary

The episode covers the 2008 Lane Bryant shooting, detailing the victims, suspect, and ongoing investigation challenges.

Key points

Community Shocked. Residents express their fear and disbelief after the tragic shooting incident.
Brave 911 Call. Store manager Roa McFarland managed to call 911 during the robbery, alerting police.
Tragic Shooting at Lane Bryant. A gunman shot and killed five women during a robbery at a clothing store in Tinley Park.
The Botched Robbery. A robbery turns deadly as five women are taken hostage and killed.
The Victims' Stories. Each victim had a unique background and life, now tragically cut short.
The Surviving Witness. Martha, the only survivor, provides crucial information to the police.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

This could have been us.

Resident expressing concern after the shooting

6:33WatchNov 16, 2023

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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