A pedophile told a judge he identifies as an eight-year-old girl as he claimed free speech laws entitle him to look at child sex abuse images.

Joseph Gobrick, 45, was sentenced to up to 20 years in prison last week in Grand Rapids, Michigan by judge Paul Denenfeld, who did not buy Gobrick’s strange claims. At his sentencing, Gobrick told the judge: ‘I’ve always been an eight-year-old girl. And even in my drawings and fantasies, I am always an eight-year-old girl.’ Gobrick acted as his own lawyer and openly spoke about his disturbing sketches and conversations while he was in jail, but it did not help his case. Instead, prosecutors called him ‘a danger to the public.’

Read more: metro.co.uk