The Des Moines police officer who fatally shot an unarmed man through the window of her patrol car in 2015 falsely told investigators she shouted warnings at the man before opening fire, according to court records.

Vanessa Miller, who resigned from the Des Moines Police Department in July 2016, told investigators in the immediate aftermath of the shooting that she repeatedly warned 28-year-old Ryan Bolinger to "get back" from her car before she fired her weapon at him.

That claim was later disproved by the video and audio recordings from Miller's patrol car.

In a deposition tied to a pending lawsuit against the city, Miller also said that the look on Bolinger's face as he approached her vehicle made it clear he intended to do her harm.

“With the way that he came at me and the look that he had on his face, there was nothing else that he was going to do,” Miller said in her deposition. “It was just the fear of being shot, instantly being shot."

Bolinger’s family has sued the city, alleging wrongful death and claiming the police department was negligent in its training and supervision of Miller.

In court filings, the city acknowledges Miller falsely claimed to have shouted warnings to Bolinger, but defended her actions.

"While initially Officer Miller may have believed she warned Bolinger to get back, she conceded this was something she thought, but did not utter," the city’s attorneys stated in court filings. "While Officer Miller apparently did not actually warn Bolinger to get back from her car, such warnings need be given only when it is feasible to do so.

"The circumstances in this case, including the facts of the speed of the event, what Miller perceived, and the fact that she was behind a closed window, make such a warning unfeasible.”

Miller was not disciplined as a result of what she told investigators, Des Moines Police Sgt. Paul Parizek said.

"Cognitive distortions, including memory, are common in high-stress situations," Parizek said.

The Bolinger family's lawsuit is not scheduled to go to trial until January 2018, and Miller’s deposition represents her first public account of what transpired the night of the shooting.

According to the police department, Officer Ian Lawler was handling a routine traffic stop at about 10 p.m. on June 9, 2015, when Bolinger pulled alongside Lawler’s patrol car, got out of his vehicle and began behaving "erratically."

After Lawler told him to pull into a nearby parking lot, Bolinger drove off, with Lawler following and Miller joining the pursuit, which never exceeded 35 mph.

After making a U-turn, Bolinger stopped abruptly near Urbandale Avenue and Merle Hay Road. Lawler pulled in front of Bolinger’s car, and Miller pulled in behind.

Within a few seconds, Bolinger exited his car and began walking toward the driver’s side of Miller’s patrol car.

Miller drew her gun, leaned back and fatally shot Bolinger through the closed driver’s side window of her vehicle.

The police department’s Firearms Review Committee subsequently cleared Miller of any policy violations, and a grand jury found no basis for criminal charges against her.

In court filings, the Bolingers’ attorneys allege an eyewitness to the shooting has given a sworn statement indicating Bolinger's "hands were raised near chest level as he approached" Miller’s car.

Miller said in her deposition that she couldn't see Bolinger's hands, but they were not raised.

Miller said she shot Bolinger as he walked toward her “with a very purposeful stare.”

She went on to describe his look as “just this thousand-yard stare — that you cannot make a connection with this person and there’s nothing but that intent look, that stare that they have on you.”

“Would you agree that he may not have had any intent to hurt you?” asked attorney Brett Beattie, who represents the Bolinger family.

“No,” Miller replied. “I truly, 100 percent believed he had true intent to hurt me. With the way that he came at me and the look that he had on his face, there was nothing else that he was going to do — other than my initial instantaneous thought, ‘He’s going to shoot me.’ That … that’s the amount of fear that was instilled in me in that split-second of that force just coming at me like that.”

Beattie asked Miller why Bolinger would have walked from the front of her patrol car, which he initially faced, toward the side of her vehicle, if he intended to shoot her.

Miller replied, “I have no idea. I don’t know what he was doing. It was just the fear of being shot, instantly being shot.”

At one point, Beattie asked Miller whether someone might have reason to approach a patrol car without intending to do the officer harm.

Miller replied, “Yes, it’s a probability. Yeah, it’s possible, but it’s possible they might not.”

Miller also said in her deposition that she was shocked to discover she had not warned Bolinger before firing.

"I was very certain that I was yelling at him to get back, get back," Miller said. "Obviously, in the audio, there's not that. And my only explanation for that is that it either — I just physically could not get it out of my mouth. In my head, I was screaming at him to get back, to get back and get back. And I thought I did."

As part of their civil lawsuit, the Bolinger family has sought access to the records of the police department’s Firearms Review Committee and its inquiry into the shooting.

The city resisted turning over the records, claiming they are attorney work-product prepared in anticipation of litigation and that disclosure would harm the department’s efforts at self-examination.

Des Moines Police Chief Dana Wingert provided the court with a sworn statement stating that “the Firearms Review Committee investigations and the critical self-analysis of officers’ actions benefit the public in several ways by being kept confidential.”

Even limited disclosure in lawsuits, Wingert argued, would inhibit “the candid, frank and sometimes even harsh appraisals of police action by trained police professionals” because their judgment could be “second-guessed, misconstrued or interpreted by non-trained police professionals on a regular basis.”

A judge sided with the Bolinger family and ordered the city to turn over the records.

The judge noted that one commission member already had testified that the committee’s job isn’t to prepare for litigation but to review every instance of an officer discharging his or her weapon in connection with work — even, the commission member conceded, if the officer walked into the woods alone and fired a weapon into the ground.

The judge, however, did deliver a blow to the Bolinger family’s case when he refused to let them amend their lawsuit to name Miller as a co-defendant with the city. That decision could not only limit the scope of the lawsuit, but also any damages that the family might collect.

As part of their defense, the city’s lawyers have asked the judge to consider a recent U.S. Court of Appeals ruling in a lawsuit brought by the family of a Van Buren County man, R. Michael Dooley, who was killed by police five years ago.

On the morning of Oct. 16, 2012, Van Buren County deputies Jon Tharp and Bradley Hudson were dispatched to Highway 2 near the town of Cantril where a man dressed in military garb had been seen walking, making obscene gestures at passing cars and carrying what appeared to be a rifle.

While en route, the deputies discussed how to approach the man, with their conversation captured by the vehicle's video recorder.

“F— it,” Deputy Tharp said, laughing. “Shoot him.”

Hudson asked what they should do if the man pointed his gun in their direction.

“Blast his ass,” Tharp replied.

As their vehicle pulled alongside Dooley, Tharp shouted, “Drop the gun!”

According to court records, Dooley grabbed his gun — which turned out to be a pellet gun — that was slung over his shoulder and attached to a sling buttoned to his coat.

As Dooley apparently attempted to loosen the sling and comply with Tharp’s command, Tharp fired, striking Dooley in the skull and killing him instantly.

The deputies later claimed Dooley aimed his weapon at Tharp.

The dash-cam video contradicted that assertion, indicating that at the moment Dooley was shot, his gun barrel was pointed skyward, his arms were crossed over his chest and neither hand was near the trigger.

Still, the Dooley family’s subsequent lawsuit was dismissed on the theory that Tharp’s actions, while based on the mistaken belief that Dooley posed a threat, were “objectively reasonable.”

The Court of Appeals agreed, noting that police officers have to make split-second decisions without the benefit of information that might later come to light.

“Dooley had done nothing illegal, and there is no evidence he threatened physical harm to anyone,” the court ruled. “But law enforcement officers are not afforded the opportunity to viewing in slow motion what appears to constitute life-threatening action.”