Lawsuit claims Sheriff’s Office used excessive force as woman fled deputies in Rancho Cordova

Two months after Sacramento County sheriff’s deputies fired 10 shots at a woman accused of trying to run over a deputy with a Dodge Challenger, a lawsuit seeking more than $1 million claims the deputies and the Sheriff’s Office spokesman provided false information on the incident to justify the use of deadly force during the confrontation.

The federal civil rights lawsuit filed Tuesday accuses deputies working as Rancho Cordova police officers of excessive force during a Nov. 20 incident involving 24-year-old Kyrieanna Liles, who was wounded in the shoulder after two deputies fired at her car as she sped away from them.

The suit, filed by Sacramento civil rights attorney Mark Merin, accuses the deputies who fired their weapons of later providing false information about the threat they faced, arguing the Sheriff’s Office issued a “misleading and biased” video news release about the incident that intentionally excluded body camera footage from the two deputies who fired their handguns.

Sheriff Jim Cooper’s office “chose to publish the false, incomplete, and misleading press release and video because they sought to influence the general public’s perception of the unlawful shooting,” the lawsuit says, adding that deputies were “shooting wildly and recklessly” in a residential neighborhood and struck inside nearby homes with bullets.

The Sheriff’s Office provides deputies under contract to work as Rancho Cordova police officers. Spokesman Sgt. Amar Gandhi said Wednesday that the Sheriff’s Office does not comment on pending litigation.

A missing dog, and a butcher knife

The incident began the morning of Nov. 20 after Liles called a police dispatcher to report that her dog was missing, and then “went to her neighbors’ house while carrying a cooking knife which she used in her occupation as a chef,” the suit says.

Liles knocked on the door but got no answer, then went into the backyard after hearing a dog barking, the suit says.

The neighbors confronted Liles in the backyard and told her to leave, and she did, the suit says.

Deputies Matthew Bollinger, a training officer, and Spencer Hettema, a trainee, were dispatched and looked up Liles’ profile in law enforcement databases that disclosed Liles had a history of “several mental health calls” in the past, the suit says.

The two spoke to Liles’ neighbors, who told deputies that Liles had put the knife away when asked and said they did not feel threatened by her, the suit says, adding that they told deputies they thought nothing should happen to Liles.

“Defendant Matthew Bollinger summarized the neighbors’ concerns in speaking to them,” the suit says.

“It doesn’t sound like she was making, like, specific threats with a knife,” the suit quotes Bollinger as saying. “Like, she wasn’t, like, demanding things from you with it, or anything.

“Kind of more, like, you know, out of her mind, maybe, like drug-addled thinking, you know: ‘My dog’s in your backyard.’ Is that kind of more how it went?”

“The neighbors agreed,” the suit says, adding that Bollinger asked, “We just wanted to figure out if a crime had occurred?”

“The neighbors responded, ‘No,’” the suit says.

‘I’m going through a lot.’

The deputies were joined by Deputy George Booth and walked over to Liles’ Malaga Way address. There, they found Liles sitting in a Dodge Challenger in the driveway with a dog in the backseat, the suit says.

Bollinger tapped on the driver-side window, the suit says, and Liles opened the door and said, “I’m sorry. I’m talking — I’m dealing with my sister right now,” as the dog wagged its tail.

“I’m sorry, I’m not dealing with this right now,” Liles added, according to the suit. “I’m going through a lot.”

She then closed the car door and Bollinger opened it, then asked her three times to get out of the car as she refused, according to the suit.

“We got to talk about something,” Bollinger said, and Liles replied, “Leave me alone,” the suit says.

Bollinger continued to try and convince Liles to get out of the car, then grabbed her left wrist “and attempted to pull her out the vehicle,” the suit says.

“Get off of me! You grabbed me! Stop!” Liles said, and Hettema reached in and grabbed her arm to try to help pull her out, the suit says.

Liles finally pressed the ignition and started the car as Bollinger said, “Don’t start the car. No.”

The car then moved in reverse and Bollinger and Hettema let go as Booth, who was at the rear of the car, backed away.

Deputies began ‘shooting wildly,’ suit says

Bollinger ran across the driveway in front of the car and positioned himself behind a large tree in the yard, the suit says.

“The vehicle moved forward following behind Defendant Matthew Bollinger,” the suit says. “Defendant Matthew Bollinger was not at risk of being struck by the vehicle after he positioned himself behind the tree trunk.

“The vehicle moved forward through the front yard, passing by (Bollinger). Defendant Matthew Bollinger was never positioned in the path of the vehicle as it moved forward through the front yard.”

Bollinger drew his handgun and “began shooting wildly in the general direction“ of Liles, using one hand to fire “without regard that his gunshots were directed towards a residence located immediately behind the passing vehicle at which he was aiming,” the suit says.

Hettema also fired at the rear of the car as it sped away, the suit says, while Booth never fired his weapon.

The suit says Bollinger and Hettema “failed to utilize appropriate law enforcement techniques when utilizing deadly force” and that they did so “by shooting at a non-suspect where no crime had been committed, shooting without any active threat or exigency, shooting at the back of a fleeing person, shooting without warning, shooting at a mentally ill person, and shooting wildly and recklessly in an occupied residential area.”

Bollinger fired seven rounds, and Hettema fired three, with six of them hitting Liles’ car and one lodging in her right arm. Other rounds struck “inside of nearby residences which endangered the occupants,” the suit says.

‘The only choice I had was to ... begin firing’

The deputies began to pursue Liles as a radio call came in, asking, “Can we just confirm: was she firing the shots at officers or was she armed?” the suit says.

“The suspect was not firing shots at officers,” Bollinger answered. “She attempted to run over deputies with her vehicle, as she fled the scene.”

The suit says that claim was false, and says Bollinger repeated it the next day in an interview with sheriff’s homicide investigators at which his lawyer was present.

“By the time I turned around, the only thing that I saw was the front of her car, which had successfully made it around the tree and it was now coming directly towards me, and I was standing there in the open front yard,” the suit quotes him as saying. “Uh, my — there was no doubt in my mind that her intent was to hit me with her car and kill me. That it was imminent. ...

“Uh, I had no cover at that point. The only choice that I had was to draw my service weapon and begin firing at the passenger compartment of her car as she was coming at me.”

The suit also claims Hettema falsely told investigators that Bollinger was in danger.

“Deputy Bollinger was, at that point, running for his life,” Hettema told investigators, according to the suit. “You can see it on his face, um, towards the tree.

“And she continued to turn it, uh, turn the car towards him. Um, and you can see that she was floored or just throttling the car as hard as she could, because it was drifting. You could hear the revving of the engine. Um, it was throwing bark at me and anybody else that was behind it.

“Um, and Deputy Bollinger, as the car was coming, uh, towards him, he pulled his gun out and he fired, um, at her. And at that point, um, when I saw Deputy Bollinger in front of the grille of the car, as it was approaching him, I pull out my gun after he fired maybe two rounds. Taking in the fact that because he fired, that’s one factor in the totality of the circumstances that played a part in saying that he knew his life was in danger.

“Um, and I knew that his life was in danger because that car was barreling towards him while he was standing in front of the grille. I fired, um, three to four rounds, um, to try and stop that imminent threat of danger to Deputy Bollinger’s life.”

Suit: Suspect, car were ‘not a threat to anyone’

The suit contends the statements were false, and that the two deputies fired at Liles “and her vehicle when it was not a threat to anyone.”

The suit also claims that a video released by the Sheriff’s Office on Dec. 31 and narrated by Gandhi, the department spokesman, “intentionally” left out footage from the cameras worn by Bollinger and Hettema “because those recordings show that the shooting was unjustified and that (Bollinger and Hettema) fired wildly at the rear of (Liles’) vehicle without the presence of any threat.”

In the video, Gandhi says, “After reversing a short distance, she drove towards an officer who’s positioned on the front lawn of the residence. She then turned her vehicle toward the officer and accelerated toward him. The officer was able to move out of the way and shot seven times towards the suspect. His partner shot three times towards the vehicle.”

“The spokesman and public information officer’s narration of the video is false,” the suit says.

Liles was arrested about 15 minutes after fleeing the scene when officers pulled her over near Folsom Boulevard and Routier Road.

After repeated commands, she left her vehicle and held her hands to the top of her head and knelt on the ground, where the suit says Deputy John Higley pushed her face-first and “slammed her body to the ground.”

Liles was arrested and remains in custody at the Sacramento County Main Jail in lieu of $500,000 bond, online records show.

She was charged by the Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office with a single count of assault with a deadly weapon —the vehicle — upon a peace officer.

Liles has pleaded not guilty and a trial date has been set for March 4, online court records say.

The dog seen in the body-worn footage “was unharmed,” Gandhi said in the Sheriff’s Office video.