26 year-old ‘We Buy Gold’ store clerk Derek Mothershead became a local hero in Hendersonville, North Carolina when he stopped an armed robber dead in his tracks with a single punch.

Mothershead was at the counter when 25 year-old Mostafa Kamel Hendi entered the store brandishing a gun and demanded he hand over the money from the register.

Normally Morthershead carries a gun of his own and says he wouldn’t have hesitated to use it, but it wasn’t at his side that day and so he held his hands up and told Hendi to take what he wanted.

In the end it was Mothershead who was tasked with taking out the cash from the till. When he was finished he held it out to Hendi, but it turns out he had no intention of actually letting the thief get away with his ill-gotten gains.

As he reached out I stepped in and I cocked-back, I pre-loaded and I hit him, the mixed martial arts fan told WYFF4 News. I hit him hard, I hit him with everything I had.

Thankfully Mothershead’s left hook knocked Hendi out cold, giving him time to disarm the robber (who it turns out was only armed with a pellet gun) and call the police.

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Mothershead, who’s inherited the nickname ‘Rocky’ since the incident, admits that his adrenaline was pumping during the altercation, but it appears he kept a remarkably cool head given the circumstances.

So much so in fact, that when the attacker regained consciousness, Mothershead forced him to clean up his own blood while they waited for the police to arrive!

As for Hendi, it later emerged that he was no stranger to armed robbery and it would eventually lead to him being sentenced to a minimum of three years and eight months in prison.