Absence due to sick father

We run a Bakery/coffeeshop with peak period this Christmas Holidays.
We have 2 employees--husband and wife--they both did not show up for work and left their phones off.  Later wife texts says they had to rush to Manila--father had a stroke.
We agreed 2 days they can take off.  After 2 days,  I called the wife because we are needing our staff badly with the peak season.  And she says her 2 sisters were not allowed to take a leave from work, so only she can take care.  I asked her--and what about you--are you not also working?  And we are at our busiest time.  So I told her to come and ask her sisters to take over.  She did not appear for one week.  Left her phone off--did not communicate any further.  The husband came to work and told us the dad was ok and was already in the Ward.  But no word from the wife still.  Then she comes to collect her salary.  With 7 days of non-appearance and no word we thought she resigned.  We follow the labor law that we need to receive a letter of resignation and allow 30 days to assess the damage caused--in this case her non-appearance caused major disruptions and loss of sales, and complaints of customers--documented in our FB page--for being under-staffed.  We did not release her salary.  She texted 4 pages of curses to me.  Then threatens to go to DOLE.  Texts my husband to release her check..to which we answered that we need to discuss.  She never answered after that and just said she has an uncle working in DOLE and she would report us. Yesterday we agreed we would talk to the husband to tell his wife to come and talk and we would release the salary inspite of damages which we had computed--in the spirit of giving.  But he also just disappeared and closed his phone.  Kindly advise.

Did she voluntarily resign or did you ask her to do so?

Within those 30 days as you mentioned did the employee report for work?

Did you request for medical documents of the father (stroke victim) to support their claim?

Did she voluntarily resign or did you ask her to do so?
She texted me that she resigned but that she could not submit her resignation letter because of her having to take care of her dad--this was in the midst of the curse texts she sent me.   Then a few hours after she texts my husband that she has not resigned and that she loves her job but that "her family is her weakness".  
Incidentally we helped her secure a laptap by signing a certification of her employment with us.  

Within those 30 days as you mentioned did the employee report for work?

30 days notice with a letter of resignation is what we demand from our employees recently due to the series of comings and goings of employees and we needed to have more permanency and control.  She left Dec. 27 and came back Jan. 5--yesterday to get her salary which we denied her--and told her to come and discuss first.  She never answered.

Did you request for medical documents of the father (stroke victim) to support their claim?

Our HR may have done so.  I will check when she comes tomorrow.  Should we do so now via text message should she receive it?

With regard to the salary of our employees, we have established a 2-week hold-back on salaries, giving us time to assess--when an employee decides suddenly to quit for whatever reason suddenly,  and expects to be paid and demands it instantly.  This has happened several times so my husband researched the law and we decided on this hold back.  Also to be able to assess--Incident reports quantified,  damages incurred, etc.  which legally we should be charging the employee but are not.  This gives us time to assess and protect ourselves. Kindly advise.

1. Without any resignation letter, you cannot consider the employee as 'resigned'.
2. If you say you are not charging the employee for 'damages', why do you need to hold the employee's salary then?