Aries, I am not defending what my wife did. She should not have paid by check (rather by CC), and should not have abandoned the item in their store, and then stopped the check. These were all unwise.
The bottom line is that she only did these things because of a mistake my child made when he opened the box. I don’t even know if it was possible to open the box without cutting through the serial number sticker. Never did I ever hear of such a thing, and I doubt it says this on the receipt which usually gives the return policy.
Be it as it may, in most places, there is courtesy, and a rule that the customer is always right. If an honest mistake was made by a child in how he opened a package, most decent institutions would right away not have made an issue over it and been understanding. This was outrageous customer service. It was only a 100 dollar item, and would not have put them out of business. This is not what you expect from a big chain.