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Single Mom Killed, Two Hurt in Flatiron Nightclub Shooting, Police Say

By  Trevor Kapp Anton K. Nilsson and Aidan Gardiner | October 12, 2015 7:56am | Updated on October 12, 2015 3:06pm

 Walikque Faussett, inset, and two women were shot outside Motivo on Broadway, police said.
Walikque Faussett, inset, and two women were shot outside Motivo on Broadway, police said.
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Facebook/grace.faussett and DNAinfo/Trevor Kapp

FLATIRON — A single mom celebrating her birthday was killed and two others wounded outside a Broadway nightclub when an angry clubgoer tried to shoot a bouncer who'd thrown him out Monday morning, sources said.

Walikque Faussett, who had just turned 24 and had a 3-year-old son, and two other women were outside Motivo, at 915 Broadway near East 21st Street, which was ending an event about 4 a.m. in which clubgoers dressed in all black, NYPD officials said.

Faussett didn't go out often because she was focused her psychology major at SUNY, but was out celebrating her Oct. 1 birthday with her best friend, family said.

 

#motivonyc #allblackeverything #libraaffair

A video posted by EriCash (@nextragleem) on

 Walter Faussett, left, and Wendy Rodriguez, right, mourned their daughter who was fatally shot outside a Flatiron nightclub.
Walter Faussett, left, and Wendy Rodriguez, right, mourned their daughter who was fatally shot outside a Flatiron nightclub.
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DNAinfo/Anton Nilsson

A man who was inside was arguing with another person when a bouncer told him to leave, sources said.

"I seen a guy being pulled back by bouncers. He was yelling at one. He said, 'I'm going to my car to get my gun,'" said Claudia Claudio, 24.

The man retrieved a gun and returned to open fire on the bouncer, but missed him completely, hitting the three women who were leaving, sources said.

"We were getting ready to leave and we heard the shots. I heard two, 'bang bang,' one after another. It was scary. It was frightening," said Ashley Valle, 25.

Two of the women were slumped on each other, one of whom was lying still, witnesses said.

"There was a lot of blood. It was very scary. It was panic. It was gunshots. Everyone ran for safety," said 34-year-old clubgoer who wouldn't give his name.

"EMS was trying to revive the girl in the green but she wasn't responding at all. It was horrible," said Cassie Frieson, 26.

Faussett, who went by "Grace" and lived by herself in Van Nest, was hit in the back and pronounced dead at Bellevue Hospital, police said.

Faussett's best friend, 25, was hit in the hip and foot, police said. She was in stable condition at the same hospital.

And the third woman, 30, was hit in the shoulder, police said. She was also in stable condition.

The shooter fled the scene in a dark vehicle and was not immediately arrested, an NYPD spokesman said.

Family outside Bellevue mourned Faussett, the eldest of nine siblings.

"She's friendly. Everyone loved her. There was not a bone in her that was hateful at all," said her mother, Wendy Rodriguez, 41.

Rodriguez railed against the shooter.

"It's not right. He takes my daughter's life," Rodriguez said.

"He gets to live. he grows old. Not mine. Not my daughter," she said.

Rodriguez was at a loss on how to break the news to Faussett's son, Alex.

"How am I gonna explain this to him? He's gonna wake up with no mom," Rodriguez said.

"She loved him," she added.

With reporting by Murray Weiss.