CHARLESTON, S.C. — A week before the sentencing phase of his trial, Dylann Roof got a visit in jail from his mother, who pleaded with him to reconsider his decision to act as his own lawyer in the fatal shootings of nine black worshippers at a South Carolina church.

But Roof was more concerned with the clothes he would wear to court. Since he could not have his first choice of his comfortable jail jumpsuit, he wanted two-tone gray pants, inseam 29, not 30, so they wouldn’t hang over his shoes. He also wanted thicker sweaters. And he wanted his lawyers at the defense table for one reason.

“So I can abuse them,” Roof said with an awkward laugh in one of four jailhouse videos released by federal court officials.

In the nearly three hours of footage from family visits, Roof laughed at his dad’s jokes, tried to trick his mom into thinking he had tinsel and a stocking in his cell for Christmas and told his half-sister he would invite her to his execution. He also upbraided his mom for feeding his cats too many treats and told his dad not to believe all of Donald Trump’s promises now that he’s president.

He even cried, convinced he had syphilis despite extensive examinations by doctors. Recently released court papers indicate that the 23-year-old told a psychologist that he never had a girlfriend.

On the videos, Roof did not mention anything about the nine people he killed in the 2015 massacre at Emanuel AME church in Charleston, where he fired 77 shots in the fellowship hall after spending 45 minutes in a Bible study.

Most of the videos show Roof’s parents and then-16-year-old sister trying to make small talk.

He was sentenced to death in January on federal hate-crime and obstruction-of-religion charges.