The innocent Brooklyn restaurant worker killed by a disgruntled patron who wildly fired off shots from his car early this month “didn’t deserve to die like that,” his wife told The Post Friday – as the NYPD released photos of the fleeing suspect’s ride.
Frankley Duran, 36, was trying to close the gates of Room 1Hundred — a restaurant on Jamaica Avenue near New Jersey Avenue in East New York — just after midnight on Dec. 2 when a motorist opened fire at the dining spot, according to cops and surveillance video obtained by The Post.
Duran, who was struck in the head, was rushed to Brookdale University Hospital Medical Center, where he was initially listed in critical condition and succumbed to his injuries two days later, authorities said.
“Everything just happened in an instant,” Duran’s wife, Yesmel Tejeda, 38, told The Post Friday.
“The way that happened, he didn’t deserve to die like that, and I’m hoping the police and the communities and everybody finds that person, because this is something that all of us, we’re gonna get through, but with time, with time.”
The shooter had flipped out over an unpaid $280 bill at the restaurant, Tejeda said.
The enraged man then got into his 2016 Chrysler with New York plate LAL 7188, callously fired toward the eatery he’d just left and sped off, cops and sources said.
Duran – who sources say had no criminal history and was not involved in the initial mayhem – collapsed to the ground as the car turned right onto Marginal Street East, the brief clip shows.
Tejeda, who had been married to Duran for two years and planned to start a family with him next year, said her husband’s co-worker called her to tell her what happened.
“They told me, ‘Oh, something happened to Frankley’…so I’m thinking he was a little drunk,” Tejeda said. “So I was like, ‘Can you put him on the phone right now?’ I was like, so mad. And they told me, ‘Oh, he can’t talk right now.’ I’m like, ‘[What do] you mean he can’t talk right now?’ I think my blood pressure went down.”
“The way that happened, he didn’t deserve to die like that.” Brigitte Stelzer
She said she rushed to the hospital to be by her husband’s side.
“I know that he knew that I was there,” she said. “I know that he knew that I was there. Yeah. I know that.”
Tejeda said police have described the investigation around her husband’s death as “a complicated case.”
“So they say that they want to have all the evidence together,” she said. “And I’m like, what do you mean? There’s cameras everywhere.”
“So that’s the part I don’t understand,” Tejeda added. “I really want the whole community and people to get connected so they can find [the suspect].”
The couple had planned to visit family in the Dominican Republic for the holidays, she said.
“And because of that terrible incident we’re not there,” Tejeda said. “Right now I’m just giving myself some time. Because this — it’s been too much. It has been way too much.”
Tejeda lit up for a moment when asked how she met her husband.
“We met in a restaurant,” she recalled. “I used to go buy food every day and I used to mind my own business, and he was there, and he used to see me every day.”
“So one day he approached me, and I was at the cashier, and he told the lady, ‘You know what? I’m gonna pay her bill.’ I’m like, ‘Excuse me?’ And he [said], ‘Yeah,’ and since that day [we were together].”
She described her slain husband as “a good guy, an amazing guy, good husband, a good son, a good brother [and] a good part of the community, a good person.”
The NYPD released two images of the suspect’s getaway ride Friday morning, in a bid for tips from the public.
Anyone with information on the case is asked to call the NYPD’s Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782).
The public can also submit their tips by logging onto the Crime Stoppers website at https://crimestoppers.nypdonline.org/, or on X @NYPDTips.