Wal-mart Heros Fired For Actions

I listened to the show; I think you are off-base on this. The employees were absolutely wrong to try and overpower an armed person with a hostage in the property room. In doing so, they risked the life of the hostage, their own lives, and any number of potential customers in the store. The fact that they suceeded without any harm is irrelevent; they did not follow Wal-Mart's stated policy, which clearly says to immediately disengage when a weapon is presented and let the perpetrator leave. I'm sure that policy is in place to specifically protect the employees and customers. If the employees had not suceeded, they would now have potential injuries, and possibly an enraged and more dangerous person at large in the store.

Additionally, you had made a reference to potential cameras in Wal-Mart stores: Wal-Mart has one of the MOST sophisticated camera surveillance systems in use today. I'm positive that they could have identified the suspect and tracked him from the time he left his car in the parking lot and walked into and around the store. You would be amazed at how good their system is. I'm sure that their system had him tracked from the time he stuffed the laptop into his shirt and would have continued to track him throughout the store, and out the door.

We can discuss whether or not the employees should be fired, but I think that a violation of this policy, which put people at serious risk, probably does rise to the level of termination. At the company that I work for, there are a few policies that, if violated, carry the consequence of termination and they are clearly noted in our policy manual that all employees must sign, acknowledging awareness. I'm betting that Wal-Mart has the same policy.