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A SEX beast is being given bereavement counselling behind bars - over the little boy he murdered.

Stuart Leggate claims to be grief stricken about sexually abusing and strangling eight-year-old Mark Cummings.

But prison insiders suspect he is just plotting to get freed early from his life sentence.

Leggate, 33, was jailed in 2004 after pleading guilty to murdering Mark at a tower block in Royston, Glasgow, and throwing his body down a rubbish chute.

The notorious sex offender was sentenced to a minimum of 20 years.

But he has recently started bereavement counselling, claiming he is finding it difficult to deal with Mark's death.

He has been bleating to bosses at Peterhead prison that he is finding it hard to live with what he did and claiming that Mark's death had a huge impact on his emotions and on his mental state.

Officials at the jail, which houses some of the country's worst sex offenders, are duty-bound to allow inmate saccess to counsellors if they request it.

Leggate will not be released for at least another 15 years.

But fellow cons believe the reason he has asked for help from a counsellor is so he can try to prove he's a changed man when he finally gets a parole hearing.

Leggate had molested other youngsters before killing Mark.

He was released from prison in 1999 after serving a four-year sentence for assaulting boys aged between three and 10.

And although he was a registered sex offender, he was housed in a tenement flat which overlooked a primary school.

Now, jail sources reckon he is already planning his next release. An insider at Peterhead - which has a unit specially designed to hold the country's most depraved sex offenders - said: "Leggate is showing total disrespect for the family of his victims.

"He has never shown any remorse for killing Mark and it is a total joke he is claiming the wee lad's death is affecting him.

"The real reason he is going through counselling is so that when he gets in front of the parole board he can say his crimes have affected him and that he should be allowed to leave prison.

"He is sick beyond belief." Mark, who had been out playing football near his home, was reported missing by his mum Margaret Ann in June 2004.

Police launched a full-scale search for the child involving a helicopter and dog team.

CCTV footage showed Leggate chatting to Mark before taking him up to his flat.

After murdering the boy, Leggate put his body in a bin bag and dumped it down a rubbish chute.

He then drove to cliffs south of Berwick-upon-Tweed to dump a bloody towel and the trousers he'd used to strangle Mark.

Jailing Leggate at the High Court in Glasgow, judge Lord Dawson said: "I regard you as a highly dangerous man and the public must be protected from you for a very long time."

Bereavement counselling has been offered to killers in the past but usually when the killer knows their victim well.

Our prison source said: "Any counselling inmates receive is 100 per cent confidential.

"Outside professionals are brought in to speak to any inmates who request it so that the content of what they are speaking about won't get back to anyone else in the prison who could slag them off for whatever they claim they are concerned about.

"The details of his meetings are secret and will never be revealed to anyone but it is outrageous that he is abusing the service for his own ends."

Recently, Leggate caused fury when he wrote to Mark's mother to apologise for his crimes.

Margaret Ann , 34, h a s campaigned for "Mark's Law" - giving parents the right to know where sex offenders live.

Earlier this month, Leggate scrawled letters to Margaret Ann in which he described in chilling detail the events which led to him taking Mark's life.

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