Police search for Chicago gunman

A police land and air search has failed to find the gunman so far

US police are still searching for a man who shot dead five women at a suburban Chicago shopping centre during an apparent botched robbery.

The gunman killed the women, including at least one employee, in the back of a clothes shop in Tinley Park, Illinois.

Police, with guns drawn, combed stores in the Brookside Marketplace looking for a suspect, but he escaped.

A helicopter equipped with infrared sensors also scoured the area but failed to find the fugitive.

Police Sergeant T J Grady said officers discovered the victims at the back of a Lane Bryant clothing store shortly after receiving an emergency call on Saturday morning.

She is the most wonderful person, and that maniac took a piece of all of us Relative of victim

"The motive in this case was robbery and at some point things went rather poorly," Sgt Grady told reporters.

"Every store was immediately canvassed and a search by air, too, has given us every indication that the offender has left the scene," he added.

He said they were hunting a man - described as black, stocky and about 5ft 9in (1.75m) - who an onlooker reported seeing leaving the shop.

The store did not have its own security camera but investigators were said to be checking CCTV footage from surrounding shops and buildings.

The Lane Bryant shop was open at the time of the shootings and the victims ranged in age from aged 22 to 37, police added.

A relative of Carrie Hudek Chiuso, 33, of Frankfort, Illinois, told the Chicago Tribune she was one of those killed.

"She is the most wonderful person, and that maniac took a piece of all of us," her sister-in-law, Jennifer Hudek, told the newspaper.

All the victims were said to be residents of the suburban Chicago area, apart from one woman who was from South Bend, Indiana.