The Wyoming Supreme Court Monday rejected the appeal of a Casper man who was convicted of attempting to kill a Casper police officer.

A jury convicted Zacharia Charles Cohen in October 2006 of one misdemeanor and five felonies related to an incident earlier that year. In January 2007, Natrona County District Judge Thomas Sullins sentenced Cohen to life behind bars without the possibility of parole.

Cohen appealed the attempted first-degree murder and aggravated assault and battery convictions based on insufficient evidence and evidence seized during an illegal stop.

Two agents from the Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation tried to arrest Cohen on March 3, 2006, at a gas station in Mills on a bench warrant for failing to appear in court, according to prosecutors. He fled the scene and led police on a chase though north Casper.

Later that day, Casper police officer Chris Wenberg pulled over a sport utility vehicle near McKinley and B streets. Cohen was sitting in the passenger seat, refused to show his left hand to the officer and gave the officer false information, according court documents. A second officer saw Cohen draw a handgun.

Wenberg pulled Cohen out of the vehicle, and the gun fell onto the floor of the SUV. The weapon was cocked and had a bullet in the chamber, according to court documents.

Cohen, in a phone call from jail a few weeks after the incident, said he was trying to stall the police officer so that he could cock the gun and shoot him in the face.

"The only reason Cohen could not complete his intention of shooting Officer Wenberg was because of Officer Wenberg's prudent actions in grabbing Cohen and dislodging the weapon from his grasp," wrote Justice Michael Golden. "This evidence is sufficient for a reasonable jury to find that Cohen engaged in substantial conduct strongly corroborative of his intention to murder Officer Wenberg."

Cohen argued in his appeal that Wenberg illegally stopped the SUV and the jury shouldn't have been allowed to consider evidence from the stop. The court disagreed, citing communication about Cohen's whereabouts, his anticipated location, Wenberg's knowledge of the area, and Wenberg's own observation of Cohen and the SUV.

"Under the circumstances, Officer Wenberg was acting on more than a simple 'hunch' when he stopped the SUV," Golden wrote. "The totality of these factors, along with rationale inferences, supports a reasonable suspicion that Cohen, the person police were searching for, was a passenger in the SUV."

Reach city editor David Mayberry at (307) 266-0633 or david.mayberry@trib.com.