Sergeant Amar Gandhi Sheriff’s Spokesman/Public Information Officer Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office
Listen: Sgt.Amar Ghandi with the Sacramento Sheriff's Department voices his opposition to AB 742 which would would prohibit the use of an unleashed police canine by law enforcement to apprehend a person, and any use of a police canine for crowd control. The bill would prohibit law enforcement agencies from authorizing any use or training of a police canine that is inconsistent with this bill.
Assembly members Corey Jackson (D-Perris) and Ash Kalra (D-San Jose) introduced AB 742 to “end a deeply racialized and harmful practice that has been a mainstay in America’s history of racial bias and violence against Black Americans and people of color,” according to a news release.
Read more here: https://legiscan.com/CA/text/AB742/2023
More from the text of the bill
SECTION 1.
(a) The use of police canines has been a mainstay in this country’s dehumanizing, cruel, and violent abuse of Black Americans and people of color for centuries. First used by slave catchers, police canines are a violent carry-over from America’s dark past. In recent decades, they have been used in brutal attempts to quell the Civil Rights Movement, the LA Race Riots, and in response to Black Lives Matter protests. The use of police canines make people fear and further distrust the police, resulting in less safety and security for all, especially for communities of color.
(b) The use of police canines has severe and potentially deadly consequences for bite victims. In a Police Assessment Resource Center study of police canine bites, researchers found that bites resulted in hospital visits 67.5 percent of the time. In contrast, other uses of force, including batons and tasers, resulted in hospital visits 22 percent of the time or less. These same researchers found that police canine bites led to permanent physical disfigurement and injuries to bones, blood vessels, nerves, breasts, testicles, faces, noses, and eyes, sometimes causing blindness.
(c) Per the California Department of Justice Use of Force data from 2021, injuries caused by police canines accounted for nearly 12 percent of cases that resulted in severe injury or death. Of these cases, Black people are more than two times more likely than any other group to be subjected to this use of force.
SEC. 2.
Section 13653 is added to the Penal Code, to read:
13653.
(a) It is the intent of the Legislature to prevent the use of police canines for the purpose of arrest, apprehension, or any form of crowd control.
(b) A peace officer shall not use an unleashed police canine to arrest or apprehend a person.
(c) A police canine shall not be used for crowd control at any assembly, protest, or demonstration.
(d) A police canine shall not be used in any circumstance to bite.
(e) A law enforcement agency shall not authorize any use or training of a police canine that is inconsistent with this section.
(f) This section shall not be interpreted as to prevent the use of police canines by law enforcement for purposes of search and rescue, explosives detection, and narcotics detection that do not involve biting.
45-year-old Daniel Murphy, apprehended by a K-9, and is being held for attempted murder and other charges.