Iraq vet sought in killing of Rainier ranger is found dead

msnbc.com ^ | 1/2/12 | AP

[ColdOne]

MOUNT RAINIER NATIONAL PARK, Wash. — An armed Iraq War veteran suspected of killing a Mount Rainier National Park ranger was found dead Monday, apparently killed by the cold overnight. A plane searching the remote wilderness for Benjamin Colton Barnes, 24, discovered his body lying partially submerged in an icy, snowy mountain creek with snow banks standing several feet high on either side.

"He was wearing T-shirt, a pair of jeans and one tennis shoe. That was it," Pierce County Sheriff's spokesman Ed Troyer said.

Barnes did not have any external wounds and appears to have died due to the elements, he said. A medical examiner was at the scene to determine the cause of death. Troyer said two weapons were recovered, but he declined to say where they were located.

[rockrr]

Good.

[Sacajaweau]

I have to say...I feel sick from this. I'm not sure we do enough for our guys after they come home.

Where do we start??

IMHO, This guy didn't really want to kill anyone except himself.

[Uncle Ike]

How typical of MSNBC to lead their headline with “Iraq vet”, with the implication that Iraq vets are killers...

Ask yourself how that headline would have read, if the killer had been an african-american muslim??

[Pontiac]

Barnes did not have any external wounds and appears to have died due to the elements,

When I read yesterday about this guy running in to the woods I figured it would end this way.

You don’t run in to the woods in winter unprepared and expect to survive.

"He was wearing T-shirt, a pair of jeans and one tennis shoe. That was it,"

I didn’t know he was this unprepared but the difference was only a matter of time.

[ConorMacNessa]

"Maj. Chris Ophardt, an Army spokesman, told The News Tribune that Barnes had been stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, near Tacoma, and was released from the Army in November 2009 after two years and seven months on active duty after charges of driving under the influence and improperly transporting privately owned weapons."

A mystery solved.

Etiam non princeps sed usque ad genua, Principis Pacis!

[Recovering Ex-hippie]

NOT GOOD!!!! THIS IS A TRAGEDY!...all the way around.

I will wait to see the story of this veteran.
Most likely he had PTSD and other problems. WE OFFER VERY LIMITED HELP TO THESE VETERANS!!

I was sick when I heard it was an Iraqi vet...I have no problem with the news stating this. It is so sad that the ONLY time the Va increases staff and services is when something like this happens and it hits the news.

The VA now has a hiring freeze on nationally for mental health workers. there are programs, but the waiting lists, and limited psychiatric beds and services are appalling.
And now more Iraqi vets will come home, needing help.

[Old Sarge]

And MSNBC-Obama proudly trumpets the “Iraq is the new Vietnam” meme.

We all came back insane baby-killers, doncha know... /s

[sockmonkey]

was released from the Army in November 2009 after two years and seven months on active duty after charges of driving under the influence and improperly transporting privately owned weapons."

Thanx for that. On yahoo, there was a slideshow with pics of the guy..neck tattoos with the seven deadly sins, looked like his forehead had grown 2 inches heighthwise from pics several years ago..I bet he was a steroid user, among other things.

[Recovering Ex-hippie]

And the VA services for substance abuse problems and emotional problems are APPALINGLY INSUFFICIENT.

the veterans do not have the powerful lobby they need to get better services.

[Recovering Ex-hippie]

there are many Vets that DO come back with emotional and other problems....Lets get the right perspective this time around and get these guys and gals the help they need.

[pfflier]

They crammed the "Iraqi war vet" in as early as they could.

Now about those 50 arrested at the Mall of America none were identified by ethnicicity...Nor are illegal aliens when associated with further crimes...Nor are muzzies when kicked off of airplanes for shouting Allah akbar...

But a white Iraqi war vet and the world needs to know.

[jocon307]

“This guy didn’t really want to kill anyone except himself.”

I haven’t read about this too closely, but if that’s what he wanted to do I guess, since he was armed he could have easily done that.

Instead he shot and killed that woman. So, I don’t know what his problem was but it seems murder was his aim, not suicide.

Glad he’s dead though, but it doesn’t do much for the two toddlers the ranger left behind.

[Jay Santos CP]

It’s quite a reliable pattern.

[immadashell]

"He was wearing T-shirt, a pair of jeans and one tennis shoe. That was it," Pierce County Sheriff's spokesman Ed Troyer said.

If I recall correctly when the story first broke this guy was classified as a "survivalist" which, evidently, he was not. Now that the "survivalist" theme doesn't work anymore, he becomes an Iraq war vet. If that doesn't pan out he will become a bible-thumping evangelical. In any case the lamestreamers will bend over backwards to spin this guy as a conservative kinda like they did with the living, breathing Ft. Hood muzzie and the Gabbie Gifford shooting nut-job they now ignore like the plague.(sarc)

[driftdiver]

The VA tends to throw a LOT of drugs at people.

[fso301]

The military gets a bad rap concerning a perception of psychological cases somehow being due to service related experiences.

I say this because three quarters of all mental illness cases have begun by age 24. The average age of onset of schizophrenia is about 21.

For many of these young men and women, they had already been exhibiting symptoms that all was not well during their teen years and it is for that very reason they were "steered" into the military out of a hope that they would "straighten up">

[RDAardvark]

“Iraqi war vet” is not an ethnicity. Am I missing something?

[FlingWingFlyer]

The commie left is already trying to pin this on the Congress for passing a bill to allow AMERICANS to carry firearms in THEIR National Parks. Liberalism is definitely a mental disease. Never let a good crisis go to waste. If it hadn’t been for that bill, this murderer would not have dared to take a weapon into a National Park. Liberals are morons! Bill Wade, the outgoing chair of the Coalition of National Park Service Retirees is the biggest moron of them all.

[Not A Snowbird]

Mother Nature dealt harshly with him, as we hoped she would. This guy would not have gone down without taking a few more of our law enforcement with him.