aox, that concern about suits from inconvenienced pax is ridiculous. Any person carrying baggage on an evac should be prosescuted at the very least for endangering the other pax and crew and for refusing cabin crew safety orders. Both charges, if I'm not mistaken, can carry a two year sentence. There may be other charges that could also be brought. So, let's start criminalising these pieces of human filth that deliberately endanger everyone else, and do it publicly and loudly so that everyone else learns to leave their stuff behind. Massive fines (to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars each) or a minimum of three years custodial sentence might start people thinking. Any evacuee with a bag in an accident where any other occupant fails to evacuate in time should be charged with murder.
I think there is a pretty broad consensus that passengers evacuating with hand luggage is a safety issue. I certainly share that view. Still though...
You cannot legislate against the "fight or flight" physiological and psychological response which causes irrational reactions in some people, particularly those who are not trained in procedures for handling an emergency. You can prosecute people, but a decent defense attorney should have no problem in presenting the defendant as a persecuted victim who acted out of panic rather than malice in a life-threatening situation. I suspect the rate of convictions would be rather low. In this case, where the evacuation was a success, the rate of convictions would be exactly zero.
For trained crew, they know that an evacuation is not ordered lightly and that it is done only when the failure to do so presents a serious threat to lives on board. People in the industry know the dangers of rapid fire propagation in cabins and the rapidity with which a seemingly benign situation can become lethal. I doubt that your average passenger has the slightest awareness of any of this, and that is in part a function of the industry itself downplaying the risks of air travel and diluting what should be clear safety briefings with an attempt to be entertaining rather than stating clearly that an ordered evacuation is an emergency in which a few seconds may be the difference between life and death. And that level of clarity may have the unintended consequence of creating panic.
If you want to remove the problem of large bags being hauled off in evacuations, prevent it in the first place by investing in quicker baggage delivery systems and by removing the financial penalty for checking large bags. Of course, expect resistance from the bean counters at airlines who have become addicted to the income stream from baggage fees.