RAOUL MOAT likened himself to King Kong and the Incredible Hulk while on the run from armed police.

The gunman said he struggled to contain his murderous rage and that he “hated himself”

because of it.

The feelings could have been triggered by a traumatic childhood in which he was beaten and once saw his mother burn all his toys, an inquest at Newcastle Crown Court heard yesterday.

A jury heard the fugitive was paranoid, suspicious, distrusted authority figures and blamed other people for his misfortune.

But he was not mentally ill, according to a forensic psychologist brought in to advise police negotiators.

Moat shot himself after a six-hour standoff with armed police, in Rothbury, Northumberland, last year.

The inquest heard that Moat was tormented by bad dreams and feelings he struggled to control.

He detailed how they affected him in recordings made on a dictaphone while he was on the run after shooting dead karate instructor Chris Brown and injuring his former girlfriend Samantha Stobbart and PC David Rathband.

He said: ‘‘I feel like King Kong when he’s right at the top of that building, all messed up, when he’s in a real mess.

“I hate myself. I do hate myself.

It is a part of me. I’m like the Incredible Hulk.

“It is not anger, it is something completely different.

“It is just like a wild animal, and it’s been there all my life.

“I’m not sure if my parents put it there or if it has always been there. I’ve had it at the back of my mind and it only ever comes out when I get hurt. It is just bonkers.

“A psychologist said it has got something to do with my mother and rejection; I don’t know; I don’t understand that kind of thing.”

He said the violence he had committed did not feel real and likened it to playing the video game Doom, in which players have to shoot monsters.

He said that when he shot his victims, his jaw had been “champing, like he was on ecstasy”.

Forensic psychologist John Hughes said the recordings showed Moat “ruminating”

what had happened as he tried to decide his next move.

The inquest, which is expected to last another three weeks, will continue with ten jurors after one was taken ill yesterday.