HTTP Error 500.19 - Error 0x8007000d

An error just started popping up on one of our apache web applications. This has worked completely fine for year until last Friday. Whenever trying to navigate to the web app, it times out and when I try navigating to port 80 on it I get the following error:

HTTP Error 500.19 - Internal Server Error

Module IIS Web Core Notification Unknown Handler Not yet determined Error Code 0x8007000d Config Error Configuration file is not well-formed XML
Config File \?\C:\Program Files (x86)\Apache Software Foundation\Tomcat 8.0\webapps\lifecdrom\web.config

The config source part of the error states line 14:

< !DOCTYPE web-app PUBLIC "-//Sun Microsystems, Inc.//DTD Web Application 2.3//EN" "http://java.sun.com/dtd/web-app_2_3.dtd">

My thought is that the issue is the ! before DOCTYPE but I am unable to edit and save the file due to it being in use.I've shut down all apache services, stopped IIS, and rebooted alone and can't seem to be able to free up the file. Making a copy of it even states the same error that it is in use.

Any ideas?

EDIT: I was able to save the file. I had to run Notepad++ as admin but now the error page is stating the line with PUBLIC is the offender.

EDIT2: It just keeps moving down the line. Here is the beginning of my web.config file before < web-app>:

< ?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?> < !-- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Project: Life*CDROM web.xml template Module: WEB-INF File: web.xml_template Revision: $Revision: 1.4 $ Last modified by: $Author: cntko $ Last modified on: $Date: 2012/02/06 10:26:33 $ Copyright: Copyright (c) 2002-2008, Corena Canada Ltd. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -->

< !--DOCTYPE web-app PUBLIC "-//Sun Microsystems, Inc.//DTD Web Application 2.3//EN" "http://java.sun.com/dtd/web-app_2_3.dtd"-->

I'd recommend using a live CD to edit the file without booting the system, it's likely that IIS is using the file as soon as your operating system boots.