I have my own opinions about things, but rarely participate in OT stuff
here, partly because I don't want to encourage OT threads, and partly
because I'm not all that interested in arguing with people who are too
stupid to see things my way. (you can imagine a smily emoticon here if
it makes you feel better.)

That said, here I am. When I think about the things that could have gone
wrong in that scenario, I think, I would not have pulled a gun. It seems
it was a simple robbery, and that no lives were directly in jeopardy.

A responsibility of gun owners is to decide *in advance* how they will
respond to various hypothetical situations. I wonder whether the
so-called hero of the story did that. If not, why not? If so, why did he
think it was a good idea, in a store full of innocent people, to play
the hero role to save a few hundred dollars of the store's money?

If the robber had done anything other than comply with the directive to
put the weapon down, things could have gotten very ugly very quickly,
with no real assurance that the bad guy is the one, or the only one, who
would have gotten perforated.