MURDER-SUICIDE Police: Elderly couple left note

HERMITAGE, Pa. -- Police said health concerns prompted a murder-suicide involving an elderly couple.
Police said Richard D. Gibbs, 83, and his wife, Marian, 80, left a suicide note explaining what they were doing before Gibbs shot his wife and then himself in their 2225 Homewood Drive home early Tuesday.
Gibbs died at the scene; his wife was alive when authorities reached the house and she was taken to St. Elizabeth Health Center, where she died at 9:35 p.m. Tuesday.
Police said they were alerted to a problem at the house when the Mercer County 911 Center got a hang-up call from the residence at 2:30 a.m. Tuesday.
Officers were sent to the house but got no response knocking on the door.
They tried the front door and found it open and discovered the couple's wallets and a suicide note signed by both on the kitchen table, police said.
The officers went into a bedroom where they found Gibbs dead of a gunshot wound to the head. He still held a .38-caliber revolver in his hand, police said.
Marian was found in an adjacent twin bed in the room. She had also suffered an apparent head wound but was still alive, police said.
The note left by the couple referred to a health problem Marian was experiencing and said the couple didn't want to be a burden to their children, police said.