Nov. 16--A Cook County correctional officer from Berwyn apparently shot herself to death in a Bridgeview home after shooting and critically injuring two residents, including a woman with whom she had been in a relationship, police said.
The dead woman, identified by police as Erika Aguirre, 28, was dressed in black when she broke into a family home in the southwest suburb and seriously wounded a man and his daughter with a semi-automatic gun before apparently shooting herself, police said.
The father, 52, and daughter, 27, were shot several times and were taken in critical condition to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, according to Bridgeview police Chief Walter Klimek.
The man's wife and two other children, a 17-year-old girl and a 14-year-old boy, were able to escape uninjured through the front door of the home before police arrived, Klimek said.
"We are completing the formal investigation but we believe that this tragic violence is the result of a domestic dispute between two individuals, the attacker and one of the victims in the home," said Klimek in a news release.
According to the release, the two women "had been in a relationship until recently when they broke up."
Authorities discovered the suspected shooter dead in the kitchen area, Klimek said earlier Monday. The woman was bleeding from the head from an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound, police said.
A semi-automatic gun was recovered along with three magazines, each of which holds up to 15 rounds, Klimek said. He said about 15 rounds were fired inside the home.
The Cook County medical examiner's office was investigating the death of the woman, Klimek said.
Bridgeview police were called to a home in the 7200 block of South Roberts Road after neighbors reported seeing a woman, dressed in black, walk next to the house with a weapon around 11:30 p.m., Klimek said. Shortly afterward, neighbors heard gunshots from inside the house, he said.
The woman broke a basement window while the couple and their three children were inside, police said.
The 17-year-old heard glass break and went to investigate. She "confronted the shooter in the basement, at which point she was able to escape," Klimek said, but not before she was shot at "a couple of times" but not struck.
The 17-year-old was able to alert her mother and brother and they were able to escape from the house.
Aguirre then allegedly confronted the father and shot him twice, police said. She then proceeded to the upstairs bedroom of the 27-year-old woman where she fired multiple times striking the woman in the head, shoulders and legs.
The mother and the younger children who escaped were interviewed by police, Klimek said.
The South Suburban Major Crimes Task Force was assisting with the investigation, according to Klimek.
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