A KENDAL man who claims incest should be legalised is now facing prison after being found in possession of dozens of pornographic images featuring children from cartoons such as The Simpsons.

Andrew Smith, 55, of Killington Drive, has been found guilty of nine counts of possessing prohibited images of children as young as eight, after 36 sketches, drawings, cartoons and computer-generated images, many depicting sexual relationships between children and older relatives, were found on disks at his home.

At Carlisle Crown Court this week he claimed the images were legitimate ‘research’ for a book he planned to write explaining why incest should be made legal.

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“I was researching the legitimacy of incest and downloaded the images to show that from an artist’s point-of-view incest is love, a wonderful, expressive thing,” he said.

“I’m not trying to promote inbreeding or the production of incestuously-conceived children but solely the enjoyment of sex and loving relationships within families.

“I want it to be accepted that sexual relationships between brother and sister, father and daughter and mother and son should be decriminalised.”

Smith told the jury he had downloaded the images to ‘enhance’ the book.

The depictions included sexual scenes between relatives, including characters from cartoons such as The Simpsons and King of the Hill.

Smith also told the court his ‘campaign’ included lowering the age of consent for sex to 12 for boys and that a relationship between a 65-year-old man and his 12-year-old granddaughter would be acceptable ‘as long as she wanted it’.

He said: “Homosexuals became legal, lesbians became legal, so now there’s only incest left and I want that to follow.”

Roger Baldwin, defending Smith, said: “He did not download these items with a view to sexual titillation or arousal or anything like that.

“He does not wish to have any sexual activities with any child.

“He was hoping to use these images to form part of this publication, this book, or whatever he was going to produce when he had the time to do it.”

Smith denied using the images for sexual gratification or having a sexual interest in ‘pre-pubescent’ children, saying: “I hate them. I’d machine gun them all.”

But Tim Evans, prosecuting, questioned why Smith had still not made a start on his book, more than a decade after first beginning his ‘research’.

He said: “There's nothing proper and sensible and indeed certainly not legal about pornographic images of children, whether they be real photos or simulations as these are.

“He takes the view that children can be sexualised, that children can have relationships with adults very, very much their senior and in particular that they can have sexual relationships with their parents, almost irrespective of what the age gap is.”

The court heard Smith downloaded the images in 2003 and 2007, when they were legal, but 2010 legislation changed this. They were seized from his home in February last year.

The jury returned a unanimous guilty verdict after less than 40 minutes.

Recorder Simon Medland QC branded the images ‘filthy, obscene and very disturbing’, telling Smith he should ‘expect imprisonment’.

Smith will be sentenced on August 29 at Carlisle Crown Court.