The search for a troubled Iraq War veteran wanted for the New Year’s Day murder of a female park ranger ended with the discovery of his body in a snowbank. Click below to read the rest of the story.

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Benjamin Colton Barnes was lying face down on the side of a mountain in Mount Rainier National Park when he was discovered by the dogs of a SWAT team that had been chasing him.

“We have SWAT team members with snowshoes on the side of a mountain,” said Pierce County Sheriff’s spokesman Ed Troyer. “This has never happened before.”

It wasn’t immediately clear what killed the 24-year-old former soldier, who had spent hours trudging through chest-deep snow to escape his pursuers.

Police had locked down the 368-square-mile park south of Seattle as they hunted for Barnes amid reports that he was wearing body armor and heavily armed.

Barnes, who had survivalist training, had fled to the remote park on Sunday after he was involved in a shooting at a house party in a town called Skyway that left four people wounded, two of them critically.

Police said Barnes gunned down park Ranger Margaret Anderson, a 34-year-old mother of two, during a “routine traffic stop” later Sunday.

As she lay dying, Anderson managed to call for help. But precious time was reportedly lost getting to her because Barnes fired several warning shots to keep deputies away.

Barnes reportedly suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and was having trouble adjusting to civilian life. He also had a a tattoo on the back of his neck listing the Seven Deadly Sins.

Local media reported that Barnes was involved in a custody dispute in July, during which the mother of his daughter took out a temporary restraining order against him.

Barnes, who has served in Iraq from 2007 to 2008, was suicidal and easily angered, the woman claimed.

More ominously, Barnes kept an arsenal of weapons in his home, she said.

By contrast, Anderson was remembered as “a person with a quick smile, a very gentle person, a very competent ranger,” said park spokeswoman Lee Taylor.

“This gunman took the life of somebody who had a great deal to live for and was making great contributions to society,” Taylor told CNN.

DN