Three employees of Academy Sports + Outdoors in Metairie, Louisiana, have been fired for chasing after a thief who allegedly stole a pistol on December 16.
The thief pretended to be a customer and was being shown a pistol before taking off with it.
Michelle Sutton, who was working as a team lead on the day of the incident, told local station WGNO that she sprang into action after hearing about the theft in progress on her radio.
“I just took off,” Sutton said. “I knew I needed some form of way to help the police.”
Sutton and two other sales associates ran out of the store looking for the thief but could not locate him.
Four days after the incident, just before Christmas, Sutton and the other employees were fired for violating company policy.
“Because we did run out the building, even though I and the other associate did stay on the sidewalk, it fell under [that] we left the front porch, as they call it,” Sutton explained.
The local station reported, “Academy’s policy states employees are not allowed to chase or physically restrain a fleeing suspect. However, loss prevention associates or managers are allowed to detain a suspect who’s exited the store by approaching the person at a ‘non-threatening distance’ and asking them to step back into the store.”
“There’s no clarification on getting [the suspect’s] location for police,” Sutton said. “I know my store director had said that they want you to be able to get the make and model of a vehicle, you know, maybe a direction in which way the vehicle went.”
“Every store that sells firearms, especially pistols that are concealable, need to have clear policy,” Sutton added. “They need to have extra training. They need to prepare for the unexpected.”
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