Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Discount Noir?

Wal-Mart Security Employees Fired for Disarming Store Gunman: "Four Wal-Mart employees have been fired after management said they violated company policy by disarming an alleged shoplifter who had pulled a gun inside the store."

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

yes, let's hear it for blind application of the letter of the law regardless of the spirit thereof or the actual situation. Wouldn't want anyone thinking for him or her self!

Scott Cupp said...

Rick -

The potential expense to the company far outweighs what they did. They should be applauded for trying to prevent the theft, but once the gun was produced, trained or not, they were in violation of the policy and could easily have gotten themselves or someone else injured, if not killed. The expense from a death in this type of situation would have been hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars compared to a theft of a small item. The retail companies all have similar policies and these guys knew what it was. Still, they should not have been fired, but perhaps given a final warning.

Steve Oerkfitz said...

Scott-They interviewed the employees on CNN and they said they were in a small office with nowhere to retreat to-they were between the gunman and the door and felt they had no choice. Also they didn't like the idea of letting him back out into the store with a weapon.

Anonymous said...

That makes almost as little sense as banks that instruct their employees to give money to bank robbers even if said robber isn't armed and even if - as is generally the case - said employee is behind bulletproof glass.

I can understand Scott's point about the gun in this case, but if there is no weapon...?

Jeff