Authorities yesterday charged a 22-year-old Halawa Correctional Facility inmate with manslaughter in the fatal beating of a 46-year-old man who was serving a life sentence for bludgeoning to death a fast-food restaurant customer with a hammer.

James Lawrence Gouveia was arrested on suspicion of second-degree murder after he allegedly punched Monty Louis Young several times in the prison yard at about 8:30 a.m. Wednesday.

Gouveia was charged yesterday with the lesser offense of manslaughter and is being held on $250,000 bail. Gouveia was serving a five-year sentence for auto theft.

Police said the two men had gotten into an argument, which led to a fight.

Young was taken to a hospital, where he died of head injuries due to blunt trauma of the head, the Medical Examiner's Office said.

Young was convicted of second-degree murder in 1998.

He was sentenced in 2000 to life imprisonment for killing 44-year-old Manoa resident Paul Ulbrich at the University Avenue Burger King on May 10, 1997.

A psychiatrist for the defense had said Young believed the customer was part of a satanic conspiracy.

Dr. Arnold Golden, part of a three-member panel to mentally evaluate Young, found he had a psychotic disorder, which may have been triggered by a brain hemorrhage a few weeks before the attack.