Husband is charged with shooting wife dead in care home as it is revealed he was 'talked out of suicide with a cuddle'
Murdered: Rita King
An elderly dementia patient was shot dead in her care home by her one-armed husband who was staying with her over Christmas.
Rita King, 81, was gunned down in front of frail residents by spouse Ronald, 86, who mumbled 'she has had enough' before pulling the trigger.
According to Daily mail, the couple are understood to be childless and the strain of looking after his wife had taken its toll on Mr King.
One neighbour said he simply 'could not cope', while another said he was 'under great stress'. Mrs Curtis, who has run the residential home for two years, said: 'This morning he came towards us with the gun and the woman was shot.'
She put her arm around the man and pleaded for him to drop the weapon.
She said: 'I put my left arm around him and put his right arm between him and the gun and said 'please, please give me the gun', and he let go.'
Mrs Curtis said at first she had not realised the gun was real or if anybody had been injured.
'He came towards me with the gun, my first thought was that it wasn't real, but then my next thought was trying to stop him hurting my residents,' she said.
Friends suspect he was driven to carry out a 'mercy killing' over the rapidly failing health of his wife, who had Alzheimer's. They said Mr King, who had only one arm, had been under increasing pressure and his wife had moved to the home six months ago.