‘This is a tough one’: Carol Stream wears pink to mourn Glenbard North graduate killed in shooting
Dressed in pink to match the hundreds of ribbons tied on trees across the community, mourners gathered Thursday at Glenbard North High School in Carol Stream to honor the memory of Giana Dettloff.
Dettloff, 19, was killed Sunday in a mass shooting near the campus of Illinois Wesleyan University in downstate Bloomington. The Glenbard North graduate and North Central College freshman had been visiting a friend when she was among nine victims shot at a backyard party.
Dettloff made her mark as a cheerleader and role model to other students at Glenbard North, from which she graduated in the spring, school leaders have said.
On Wednesday, friends and community members tied the pink ribbons — Dettloff’s favorite color — on trees, fences and light poles around the school, Carol Stream’s Veterans Memorial Plaza and elsewhere in the village.
The idea, family friend Robert Vrankovich said, was to “paint the town pink.”
“It is honestly what Carol Stream is about,” he said. “We care about each other, and when things like this happen, just automatically everybody starts stepping in.”
Mayor Frank Saverino called the community response to its loss “phenomenal.” He knows what it is like to lose a child — his son, Dominic, died at age 36 in 2010, and a charitable organization in his name funds scholarships for local student leaders.
“I know what they're going through,” Saverino said. “I can feel it.”
Saverino said the Dettloff family is loved in the community. Dettloff’s father, George, coached youth sports in Carol Stream, while Giana helped the younger Panthers cheerleaders.
“This is a tough one for our village,” he said. “It's not like somebody passing away. But to lose a 19-year-old that had her whole life ahead of her?”
A GoFundMe online fundraiser has been established to support her family.
No suspects are in custody in connection with the shooting. Two victims remain hospitalized and continue to receive medical treatment, Bloomington police said Thursday.
szalusky@dailyherald.com