Updated 3/25/2022 10:45 PM
One man was killed and a teenage girl hurt, and two suspects are on the loose after what Rosemont police are calling “an isolated shooting” that sent shoppers scattering inside an outlet mall Friday evening.
Rosemont police Sgt. Joseph Balogh said they were called at 7:08 p.m. to a report of a shooting inside Fashion Outlets of Chicago, near the food court. Two gunshot victims — a man in his mid-20s and a 15-year-old girl — were taken to the hospital. He died at the hospital, Balogh said.
The girl was shot in the right wrist and is stable, he said.
Police heard only from witnesses that there’s a possible third victim, but Balogh said no third person was taken to a hospital and they haven’t heard of one from any hospital.
Video surveillance confirms that two suspects left the mall area in a red vehicle before they arrived, Balogh said, adding he didn’t know if one or both were shooters.
“We want to urge the public and let them know this area is safe. This was an isolated incident, there was not an active shooter here,” Balogh said.
Police shut down and searched the mall, guarding it with rifles, and evacuated shoppers. Other shoppers took cover inside stores; police later conducted a second search of the mall to release them.
Multiple police cars and ambulances from various towns were on the scene. Many shoppers waited outside after the shooting for police to allow them or escort them to their vehicles.
The mall will remain closed while police investigate, Balogh said.
Jennifer Dwyer of Naperville said she was shopping at the Columbia store with her son Aidan on the first floor during her first visit to the mall.
“I was just dropping my husband off at the airport. Traffic was bad. So I thought let’s kill some time and go shopping,” she said.
Dwyer said she soon heard at least six gunshots.
“I’m not too familiar with gunshots, but I don’t know what else it could have been,” she said.
In a couple of seconds, a nearby store manager hollered at shoppers to take cover in the store.
“She came and said, ‘Everybody come come,’ and we all ran into the back storage area,” Dwyer said.
She said she was there for about an hour and 15 minutes.
Diana Avina of Chicago said she was working in the back of the Tory Burch store and wasn’t aware of the shooting until all the customers ran to the back of the store.
“And that’s when everyone was saying there was gunshots,” she said. People told her the shooting happened on the first floor by the Build-A-Bear and Carter’s stores.
Mehreen Mehmood of Aurora said she was on her way to the Prada shop when she heard the shots, then ran into the Boss store. Others were running away as well, she said.
“I’m still shaking,” she said, as she waited outside for permission to go into the parking lot and retrieve her vehicle.
Manda Rose Decker said on Twitter that she was shopping at the mall with her husband and heard six gunshots. They ran to escape the mall but encountered a locked door at the back of the food court, she said, but ultimately they were able to exit.
“We are safe but apparently just missed being random innocent victims,” she wrote.
Stringer Harris of Hazelcrest said he was upstairs in the mall when he heard four to five shots and saw people starting to scatter, drop their items and run to the closest possible exit.
“It was a lot of kids in the mall,” he said. “I was more concerned about getting the kids out safely and the women and children.”
