"Don't try that here". (Exercising the Right).

It was hot in Gastonia, North Carolina, on November 28, 2001, so late in the day someone at the West Main Newsstand Book Nook propped the back door open to cool the establishment. Shortly before 10 p.m., six persons remained in the store, including owner Gary William Cannon; a part-time clerk who had just returned from a religious service at a local church; a woman and her two daughters; and the owner of another nearby business.

At around 9:45 p.m., two armed men, their faces covered by pantyhose, entered through the back door and shouted, "This is a robbery." One stayed near the door, pointing his gun at the clerk's head, while the second walked to a table where Cannon and the three women, two of them pregnant, were chatting. He aimed his gun at the store owner and, according to Cannon, threatened his life.

Cannon himself was not armed, but he knew that one of the women normally carried a .45-caliber handgun in her purse. When the second robber pointed his weapon at the women, Cannon reached into the nearby purse, grabbed the gun, and told the would-be robber: "Don't try that here." When the thug made a menacing move, Cannon fired twice, striking him in the neck and chest. Derick Christopher Foust, 29, was later pronounced dead at a local hospital. According to court records, he had been convicted numerous times for selling cocaine and driving while intoxicated.

Foust's accomplice fired a shot that narrowly missed one of the women, then scurried away so hastily that he left his shoes behind.

The next day's Charlotte Observer reported that Cannon "said he was sad he'd shot Foust. But the experienced hunter and target shooter ... said he was more concerned for the three female friends who were in the shop." Noting that "Cannon's friends called him a hero for saving their lives," the Observer quoted the other business owner in the shop during the attempted holdup as saying, "He took a chance with his life and saved everyone else."