Publication Date: 05-14-2026

Who Killed These Women? (The Tinley Park 5) (2026) review

Dir. Charlie Minn

By: Steve Pulaski

Rating: ★½

On February 2nd, 2008, a man impersonating a delivery driver entered a Lane Bryant department store in Tinley Park, IL, a suburb of Chicago. In short order, he brandished a firearm, and corralled four customers, a part-time employee, and the store manager into the backroom. After forcing the manager, Rhoda McFarland, to restrain each of the hostages with duct-tape, he spent an indeterminate amount of time holding them before shooting them in the head, execution style. One of the women, known only as “Martha,” managed to survive by shifting her head milliseconds before being shot, causing the bullet to graze her neck. The other five were killed. To date, the suspect has never been identified.

Growing up roughly 30 minutes from Tinley Park, I vividly remember that weekend, and the subsequent days where coverage of the inexplicable murders seemed wall-to-wall on every news station. I can also remember the composite sketch of the suspect’s face being emblazoned on telephone poles in the area, as well as newspapers far-and-wide, including one of the most chilling I still have burned into my memory. I’m the prime audience for Charlie Minn’s new documentary Who Killed These Women? (The Tinley Park 5), and it gives me no pleasure to say this is a shoddy, Bush League effort.

I do believe Minn had noble intentions in bringing this case back into the public consciousness. However, when I interviewed him several months ago, he sounded frustrated by the lack of cooperation with the Tinley Park Police Department. The Tinley Park Police have been tight-lipped on the case since it happened, and while it’s been reported that the FBI and even the Secret Service were at one point involved with the investigation, the extent of their involvement is unknown.

Consequently, Who Killed These Women? lacks an authoritative account of the investigation, and before-long, the already overlong 109-minute documentary descends into conspiratorial madness, with Minn asking paramedics, lawyers, and even victims’ families whether or not the anonymous survivor named Martha had anything to do with the murders. Nevermind the fact it’s been documented that Martha came into work last minute to cover another employee’s shift. Such poppycock would be questionable if it were spouted by a low-level YouTuber. To have it come from a professional documentary filmmaker is just ludicrously unbecoming.

But that’s just one of the myriad of problems with Who Killed These Women?, which is scant on new insights into the unsolved murders, and is structurally disastrous. The first 15 minutes of the movie is a lackluster, student film-esque reenactment of the murders; the only standout performance is that of the killer, portrayed ominously by Eugene Ace Banks. From there, Minn (mostly off-camera) talks to medics and first responders who reveal the sights they saw when they entered the Tinley Park Lane Bryant store on that morning, minutes after the murders occurred. Kevin Collinge, the first medic on-scene, and Dawn Palacek, who transported the lone survivor, offer some morsels of intrigue just based on their professional accounts, but what does this really tell us? We can imagine how awful it must’ve been to see five women lying dead and bound on the backroom floor. We don’t necessarily need the gritty details, especially when they add up to nothing in the larger case.

Minn’s film appears to get going when the victims’ family members are on-screen, most notably Maurice and Vince Hamilton, McFarland’s brothers, who get the most screentime. They are emotionally guarded but transparent in their feelings, and their memories of their late sister are piercing in their specificity. Granted, they would hit harder if Minn knew when to stop interrupting or leading his subjects, but you’ll just have to get used to that as the viewer. Unfortunately, only McFarland’s relatives and the late Carrie Chiuso’s brother, Mike Hudek, took part in the film. Once that’s revealed, the hope for family members and their memories to carry this doc home fall apart as well.

By then, more than 40 minutes in, Who Killed These Women? proves aimless, with Minn grasping at straws trying to keep the conversation going. The editing is whiplash-inducing. The lack of security cameras in the strip-mall in which the Lane Bryant was located is addressed, theories of how the killer escaped are discussed, the whereabouts of Martha remain unknown, and title-cards that recall Windows Movie Maker try to fill in the blanks of where compelling interviews and footage should be.

It’s abundantly clear that Minn thought the Tinley Park Police Department would be more forthcoming with information and willing to participate in this documentary. Their absence — not to mention the absence of any retired police officers from nearby Oak Forest, Orland Park, etc — blows a crater-sized hole in the possibility for any revelations about this case coming to fruition.

When production on Who Killed These Women? was announced in summer 2025, a limited theatrical release date of February 2026 was revealed too. With an imposed deadline already in place, the rushed appearance of the entire project is understood, albeit inexcusable. That Minn is too consumed with making himself a full-blown participant in the case by the end means he misses the opportunity to instead make this movie about honoring the incalculable pain and grief of the victims’ families is unfortunate. For him to devolve into rock-brained conspiracies involving the lone survivor is documentary malpractice. At best, this should’ve been a short film. At peak, it might’ve made for a better podcast, with someone running the board with a clearly defined “mute” button for Minn’s microphone.

NOTE: For information regarding the unsolved 2008 Lane Bryant murders in Tinley Park, IL, you can contact the dedicated tip line at (708) 444-5394 or email lanebryant.tipline@tinleypark.org.

NOTE II: Upon the start of production, I wrote about Who Killed These Women? (The Tinley Park 5) for Y105’s website. In addition, I had the pleasure of interviewing director Charlie Minn. You can take a listen to that interview below:

Starring: Eugene Ace Banks, Lisa Scott, Ala Mohammad, and Cassie Negron. Directed by: Charlie Minn.