Ronald King charged with murder of 81-year-old wife Rita at Essex care home

Provisional post mortem results showed Rita King had been shot in the head with a 1934 Enfield revolver

Rita King, 81, who was shot dead at the De La Mer care home in Walton-on-the-Naze (PA)

The husband of an elderly woman who was shot dead at her Essex care home has been charged with murder.

Ronald King, 86, is charged with killing Rita King, 81, at the De Le Mer House care home in Naze Park Road, Walkton-on-the-Naze, Essex police said.

Mrs King was declared dead at the scene on Monday morning where her husband was arrested. Police said King, of Cedar Close, Walton-on-the-Naze, has been remanded in custody and will appear at Chelmsford Magistrate's Court on Wednesday.

Provisional results from a post mortem examination carried out on Mrs King’s body showed she had been killed by a gunshot wound to the head.

The bullet came from what is believed to be a 1934 Enfield revolver which was recovered at the scene.

An Essex Police spokesman said: "Detectives have charged a man with the murder of Rita King at Delamer (sic) House care home in Naze Park Road, Walton, on Monday December 28.

"Ronald King, aged 86, of Cedar Close, Walton, has been remanded in custody to appear before Chelmsford Magistrates' Court on Wednesday December 30."

King is understood to have been staying at the care home for a week over the Christmas period and reportedly said: “She has had enough”.

The manager of the care home, Julie Curtis, has spoken of how she discovered the man, put her arm around him before telling him to “please, please give me the gun”.

Mrs Curtis said at first she had not realised the gun was real or if anybody had been injured.

A body is removed from De La Mer House in Walton-on-the-Naze, Essex (PA)

She told the Press Association: "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."

"My first thought was that [the gun] wasn't real, but then my next thought was trying to stop him hurting my residents," she said.

No other people were near the incident, Mrs Curtis said, adding staff had dealt with the situation "brilliantly".

Police arrested a male resident of De la Mer House in Walton on suspicion of murder (PA)

She said: "It's a shock - I cannot believe it happened at a residential care home.

"Our staff have been brilliant, staying calm and speaking to the residents who live here. Under the circumstances, everyone is coping very well."

Mrs King and her husband moved to the area from London 18 months ago, but the elderly woman was moved into the De La Mer home within a year after a series of falls, the MailOnline reported.

Neighbour Maureen Thornton, 67, told the website paramedics had often been called to the house when Mrs King fell over and that Ronald had been staying with his wife in the home over Christmas.

She described him as “a perfectly nice normal man to say hello to”.

“He was only a little thing and had part of his arm missing. We thought that perhaps he had a military background but he never told us that. We are wondering now if he still had his service revolver,” she added.

Douglas Carswell, the Ukip MP for the area, said he was "very shocked" by the news, adding that Walton-on-the-Naze was usually a peaceful place.

Additional reporting by PA