Son of Hillsborough Home Depot worker killed wants crackdown on theft, he tells 'Nightline'

HILLSBOROUGH, N.C. (WTVD) -- On Gary Rasor's 80th birthday, his children asked him to retire because there was no financial need for him to work. Rasor refused and told his children that he loved working at Home Depot, where he trained young employees and enjoyed interacting with customers.

Rasor continued to work for more than two years at The Home Depot in Hillsborough until he was confronted by a man stealing three pressure washers last October. The man violently pushed Rasor, who crashed to the floor and was taken to the hospital -- where he died of his injuries a few days after turning 83.

"He was just going to ask him for a receipt," Rasor's son Jeff said of the man who attacked his father.

In an interview airing Thursday night on "Nightline," Jeff Rasor told ABC News' Erielle Reshef that he wants authorities to crack down on the growing phenomenon of organized retail crime.

"There has to be consequences in my mind, and the consequences have to fit the crime," he said. "I can't imagine that any piece of equipment in Home Depot is worth a life -- and so when you find out it's $837, it's just pretty bad."

Five months after Gary Rasor's death, another Home Depot employee was killed after confronting a shoplifter in a California store. Blake Mohs, a 26-year-old loss prevention employee, was shot in the chest while trying to stop a theft at a Home Depot in April. Two people have been arrested on murder charges in the case.

Jeff Rasor told ABC News that his father would want the "appropriate measures" to be implemented to discourage retail theft and to help people avoid a life of crime.

"He (wouldn't want) this guy to be in jail the rest of his life," Jeff Rasor said of the man who fatally attacked his father and has since been arrested on a murder charge. The case against the suspect, Terry McMillian, is still pending.