Let’s take a stroll down memory lane to Sept. 4, 2009.

Two men — strike that.

Two thugs robbed the Manteca Bank of America at gunpoint.

They entered the bank shortly before 11 a.m.

One carried a semi-automatic handgun.

The other a duffle bag.

They took an undetermined amount of cash.

What they didn’t count on was an alert citizen that saw them enter the bank.

The citizen used their cell to call 9-1-1.

They also didn’t count on two Manteca Police motorcycle officers — John Machado and Bill Walmer — being within a half a block of the bank writing tickets when dispatch put out the call.

Walmer headed for the rear of the bank, Machado for the front.

Women in a beauty shop just off the alley on Lincoln Avenue told officers they saw the two men running toward the business.

Another businessman at the Sherman Avenue end of the alley said one of the two run by with a gun in his hand.

A resident on the south side of the alley said the men run through his back yard followed by the two officers.

The men ran back toward Lincoln Avenue and entered  a duplex.

Neighbors told officers the men had entered the duplex.

Here’s what happened next.

Police set up a perimeter.

Nearby Manteca High was put on a lockdown.

Within minutes, there were 45 officers on scene from five agencies besides Manteca Police.

Ripon Police. San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Department, East Bay Park Police. A ranger from Caswell State Park. The FBI.

The East Bay Park Police Department dispatched a helicopter.

The Stanislaus County Sheriff’s Office sent its armored car.

The armored vehicle knocked down the rear fence to gain access to the property.

The city’s bomb squad robot was put into service so officers could make use of its camera and listening devices.

The robot was also used to knock out windows so officers could gain access.

SWAT officers shot 17 rounds of tear gas into the duplex using the cover of the armored vehicle.

As the gas was wafting out of the windows,  the 26 year-old suspect burst through an attic vent at the front of the duplex.

The suspect stayed on the roof for several minutes until he could sit up.

Officers told him to slide off the roof and into the bushes.

He declined.

The SWAT officers pulled him by his foot down into bushes and they placed him face down on the grass and cuffed him.

With the other suspect still in the duplex, officers shot more tear gas into the duplex.

SWAT team members wearing gas masks methodically went through both sections of the duplex room by room.

By 9 p.m. — 10 hours after the robbery — they declared the house all clear.

They had yet to check the small attic.

Shortly before 11 p.m., Officer Dale Goforth climbed into the access to the attic with his police dog “Gage”.

The second suspect was repeatedly ordered to come out.

When he didn’t, Goforth ordered Gage to do his job.

Within minutes, the second suspect made his presence known with his screams caused by the attacking dog.

The suspect surrendered and was immediately treated by medics for dog bites to the face and the effects of being gassed.

He was transported to the San Joaquín County Hospital.

It was a textbook case of using less than lethal force. And when that didn’t result with the second of the two suspects that police did not know whether was armed or not still not surrendering, police resorted to using a trained police dog to end the 12-hour standoff.

If Assemblymember Corey Jackson of eastern Riverside County has his way, police in California will never again  be able to use unleashed police dog to apprehend a person — regardless of the situation.

His bill that is making its way through Assembly committees, would also ban the use of a police dog for crowd control.

Jackson, to his credit, has made tackling systemic racism in California a cornerstone of his legislative service.

Assembly Bill 742 in its current form is a cure that will put lives at risk.

The proposed legislation as drafted by Jackson reads as follows:

“The Legislature finds and declares the following:

“(a)The use of police canines has been a mainstay in the constant dehumanizing, cruel abuse of Black Americans and people of color in this country. Be it in response to the Black Lives Matter protests over the murder of George Floyd, during the Los Angeles Race Riots and the Civil Rights Movement, or by slave catchers, police canines are a carryover from a dark past that is not often discussed.

“(b)The use of police canines has serious consequences. Research on this topic found that canine bites resulted in hospital visits 67.5 percent of the time, while other uses of force, including batons and tasers, resulted in hospital visits 22 percent of the time or less. Research has also found cases of permanent physical disfigurement and injuries to bones, blood vessels, nerves, breasts, testicles, faces, noses, and eyes, sometimes causing blindness, as a result of canine bites. Based on these findings, the researchers stated that canine bites should be considered a level of force immediately below deadly force. They equated a police canine bite to an officer swinging a baton with three-centimeter spikes attached.

“(c)The use of police canines mirrors other biases in use of force by police. Per the Department of Justice Use of Force data from 2016 to 2019, inclusive, Black people are 3.5 times more likely than any other group to be subjected to use of force due to police canine use, with Hispanic people being the second most likely compared to cases involving White people at six per one million people.”

Jackson may have a strong case for banning the use of police dogs in some if not many instances for crowd control.

Whether that is good micromanaging is debatable.

But what isn’t debatable is the foolishness in insisting on a 100 percent ban on police being able to unleash a properly trained police dog to apprehend a person.

Had the second suspect been armed in the Manteca incident, there is no guarantee that an officer going up into the crawl space may have resulted in two dead people — the suspect and the officer.

Most would also consider 12 hours more than  a reasonable amount of time for a police dog to be put into action.

There are cases every day in California where officers are faced with suspects trying to escape arrest by hiding in small spaces that puts them at a significant advantage over officers especially if they are armed suspects.

They are numerous other instances where officers are put in a position of jeopardizing their personal safety where a properly trained police dog is used to assure the best outcomes for both the officer and the suspect.

Sheriff Bull Connor is not alive and well in California circa 2023.

What is thriving, though, is serious crime.

Checking reputable sources since 2015 and there have been dozens and dozens of cases where police dogs were killed by suspects. That includes a San Joaquin County K9 killed last month while apprehending a burglary suspect in Banta near Tracy. The dog was stabbed to death.

On the other hand, only three people killed by police dogs could be found. All three bled to death.

One death is one too many.

But the real question is how would the death tally change if police had a complete ban on using trained fogs to apprehend a suspect.

If the option of a police dog is taken away, that is one less thing that can be used besides a gun.

Pardon the rework of the old “going  to the dogs” line, but if Assembly Bill 742 becomes law, California will be going to the criminals.

This column is the opinion of editor, Dennis Wyatt, and does not necessarily represent the opinions of The Bulletin or 209 Multimedia. He can be reached at dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com