A father killed his teenage daughter after he was unable to cope with her severe anxiety problems, a court heard.

Richard Kray strangled 19-year-old Olivia and then tried to do the same to her mother Damyantee “Sheila” Cowan.

After both attacks Kray went to Herne Bay poice station and confessed.

The 64-year-old denied murder and his guilty plea to manslaughter by diminished responsibility was accepted. He also admitted attempted murder.

After hearing the tragic facts, a judge indicated he would pass a “hybrid” order which would allow Kray to be treated in hospital under the Mental Health Act and then transferred to prison.

Prosecutor Simon Taylor said Kray had made efforts to help and care for his daughter.

Doctors described her anxiety as “severe, always needing her father with her whenever she wanted to go out”, adding: “Mr Kray and Sheila had reached the end of their tether with her”.

By March last year Kray was telling those treating Olivia he could not cope with her behaviour.

The next month he was signed off sick from work with exhaustion because of Olivia’s high dependency on him.

Mr Taylor said an example was on April 29 Olivia called the Community Health Trust nine times and the police once because her father had left her for a break.

On May 11 and 12 she made eight calls to the police and two to the trust about the whereabouts of her father.

“It is clear the pressure was taking its toll on Mr Kray,” Mr Taylor told Maidstone Crown Court today.

He told his sister Janice Wallace “It would be easier to kill the three of them” as he could not see any future.

Mr Taylor said it was presumably a reference to himself, Olivia and Miss Cowan.

On June 4 and 5, Olivia texted her father seven times, three of which said “Help”.

She went to Canterbury police station and said her father was having a mental breakdown.

“It would appear that by July the defendant’s ability to cope with his daughter’s illness was rapidly diminishing,” said Mr Taylor.

On July 15, while returning from Bluewater shopping complex with Olivia and Miss Cowan, Kray, while being badgered by his daughter, said: “Let’s crash the car. Let’s all be killed together.”

It was six days before Kray killed Olivia on July 21 at Westlands Caravan Park in Canterbury Road, Herne Bay, where they lived.

He had three days earlier told the mother of Olivia’s friend: “You know what, I’ve even thought about killing the pair of them. Obviously, I wouldn’t. I love her, she’s my daughter.”

He added: “It’s my bloody fault. I’ve let it go on too long.”

After strangling Olivia he went to Miss Cowan’s home in Gordon Road when she was not there.

After she arrived, Kray told her Olivia was upstairs. As she went to go upstairs Kray grabbed her neck with both hands.

“Miss Cowan describes being frozen with panic,” he said. “She couldn’t breathe and genuinely thought the defendant was going to kill her.

“He continued to hold her neck. She describes it as feeling like it lasted for half an hour, and explained at one point he led her from the lounge into the hallway while still holding her neck.

“He then released his grip on her neck and put his hands over her mouth. She began to struggle and cried out to let her see her daughter.”

The victim kicked out at a radiator and eventually managed to break free. Kray picked up a cushion and she believed he was going to smother her.

But she ran out the back door and fled to the police station.

While there, Kray walked in and declared: “You can arrest me. I’ve killed her.”

He added: “Yeah, yeah, in Herne and I came round to kill Sheila as well, but she was too strong for me and I couldn’t do it - and that’s the top and bottom of it. I’m just at my wit’s end with her and everything and my mental health problems, and disturbing the neighbours honestly.”

Kray then told how Olivia was lying dead in the caravan.

“We’ve had months and months and months of mental health problems with my daughter and Sheila, and it just come to a head and I couldn’t stand it any more, and I just did it.

“And I come round here as cold as you like to do it to her as well, and I couldn’t.”

After his arrest, he replied: “I’m guilty. I couldn’t let her suffer any more, so I just, I know it sounds callous, but I couldn’t think of anything else to do. I’m at my wit’s end for months and months. I know it’s no excuse.

“I just blacked out. I knew what I was doing.”

He told another officer: “I’ve killed my daughter. My daughter’s dead. I strangled her. I didn’t intend Sheila to live. I just had it with her mainly. She’s made malicious phone calls to all my family, to all my work places, and I’ve just lost the plot.”

He told the custody sergeant: “I want to die.”

After killing his daughter, he had called his sister and stated: “Jan, I’ve done a terrible thing. I have killed Livvy. She is laying across the bed.”

“I’m guilty. I couldn’t let her suffer any more, so I just, I know it sounds callous, but I couldn’t think of anything else to do. I’m at my wit’s end for months and months. I know it’s no excuse" - Richard Kray

Police and an ambulance crew went to the caravan park in the afternoon and found Olivia’s lifeless body on a bed. CPR was performed for 43 minutes to no avail.

Judge Philip Statman said Kray worked with children who had difficulties and it was not a case where Olivia failed to get treatment. He was keen for her to have therapy.

“I would not want it thought the medical services failed her in any way,” he said.

The judge said of the attack on Miss Cowan: “The real issue here is the sheer horror of being in your own home and someone who has been your partner strangling you in the manner she describes.”

After hearing from a psychiatrist about Kray’s mental state, Judge Statman agreed with Oliver Saxby QC, defending, that the appropriate sentence was a hybrid order, and not a case for a life sentence or an extended sentence.

“He is someone with regret and remorse for what he has done,” said Mr Saxby. “A sentence of some length is inevitable.”

The judge added he would think “long and hard” over the weekend and pass sentence on Monday.