GREENSBURG – A Kansas man was sentenced Wednesday to 20 years in prison for killing a man three days after he was released from a state psychiatric hospital in a case that prompted a state inquiry.

Brandon Lee Brown, 31, Havilland, was sentenced in Kiowa County District Court by Judge Sidney R. Thomas to 240 months in prison, according to Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt.

In October, Brown,  pleaded no contest to second-degree murder. Prosecutors said he beat 61-year-old Jerry Martinez so severely in May 2015 at a residential care facility that Martinez died a few weeks later.

Brown spent a week at the state-run psychiatric hospital in Osawatomie after he scuffled with two other residents at the Haviland Care Center west of Wichita. The beating happened after he returned to Haviland.

The case was investigated by the Kiowa County Sheriff’s Office. Assistant Attorney General Charles W. Klebe of Schmidt’s office prosecuted the case.