Peck's identity was confirmed by New Hanover County chief deputy Tom Parker. The FBI is now handling the case.
The former University of North Carolina at Wilmington studentwas charged Saturday with first-degree murder in Friday's shootingdeath of ex-girlfriend and UNCW student ChristenNaujoks, 22. Peck, 28, had been at large since the shooting, and lawenforcement officials said he was armed with an assault rifle andwas considered dangerous.
Law enforcement agencies in western North Carolina were advisedMonday to be on the lookout for Peck, according to a statement fromthe Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Officers encountered a manbelieved to be Peck at Newfound Gap on the Tennessee-North Carolinaline around 11:16 p.m., park officials said.
The man was seen driving south on U.S. 441. Park rangers andCherokee County sheriff's deputies set up a roadblock. The carapproached the roadblock, then turned around, and park officialssaid shots were fired around 11:34 p.m.
The car was found wrecked several miles north of the roadblock.Peck was found face down in a creek, wearing a t-shirt and shortpants. Park officials said reports of a woman dead in the park wereincorrect.
The cause of Peck's death has not been determined.
Park officials and two detectives fromthe New Hanover Sheriff's Department are assisting the FBI in the investigation that is expected to take two to three days.
Deputies found Naujoks lying on the sidewalkof her apartment complex Friday night with gunshot wounds. Witnesses said awoman was banging on doors as a man chased her with a rifle,shooting her three times.
Peck was arrested in April on charges of stalking Naujoks andmaking harassing calls to her. A court hearing on those charges hadbeen scheduled for Wednesday.
On April 26, Naujoks filed for a court protective order, statingthat Peck had threatened to get a gun from his father's house tokill himself on her doorstep. The request also said that Peck left17 obscene phone messages at Naujoks' mother's house in Ohio andthat Peck was following Christen Naujoks around school and stoppingher from entering her car.
In that filing, Christen Naujoks advised police to consider Pecka threat.
"He's crazy," she wrote. "He will do anything to get awayfrom police."
Peck was ordered to stay away from Naujoks and forbidden topossess a firearm. A later court document indicated he had enrolledin anger management and sexual offender treatment programs.
Naujoks was killed one month after the May 5 slaying of anotherfemale UNCW student, Jessica Lee Faulkner, 19, of Cary, who waskilled in her dorm. Fellow student, Curtis Dixon, 21, of Charlotte,has been charged with first-degree murder, first-degree rape, andfirst-degree kidnapping.
Following Naujok's murder, Chancellor Rosemary DePaolo said the school will step up its efforts to "review procedures and processes to protect our students.
"This recent tragedy further compels our commitment and resolve to explore what additional measures, if any, the university can take to ensure the safety of our university community," DePaolo said.
Meanwhile, Thomas Conway, a vice provost at North Carolina State University, said: "This could have happened on any of our campuses.
"None of us are immune to this kind of activity," Conway said.
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