EDIT : To clear a few questions up.

No I was not under the influence at the time

Voluntary manslaughter because there are other ways to hold someone on the ground and immobilize them, without wrapping their neck and choking their air supply and blood to their brain for 2 minutes. I made a choice to choke him, I could have pulled an arm behind his back or something but like I said, he was bigger than me and I imagine at the time my adrenaline fueled body thought the choke would be safer.

I am apparently the only one who saw the bottle in his hand, so there was no mention of him holding a potentially deadly weapon when it came to sentencing.

I do believe my wrestling experience had something to do with the voluntary in my sentencing, I mentioned it in the police report after I was initially arrested before I knew he was dead. If I had known he was dead I wouldn't have kept it a secret anyway, I made a mistake and knew that if I wasn't 100% honest from start to finish I could end up in a much worse situation.

I wasn't very close with many of my co-workers and only saw my old manager again when he acted as a witness, the woman being attacked did come to visit me in prison a few times but it was always really difficult for us to talk about anything and eventually she just stopped coming to visit.

I dont think I should have gone to prison, I think there should be a different system in place for situations such as this, I was not a danger to society, nor did I need some form of rehabilitation. I dont have an answer to what the system for people like me should be, but as a result of my time in prison I have a lifelong stigma attached to me.

I am not aware if I felt him black out or not, I remember I felt him stop resisting me, but im not aware of how long I had held on at that point, and not aware of how long I continued to hold on. My best guess was that I was wrestling him for a minute or so before I got the choke, then another 2 minutes before I either let him go or somebody told me to let him go, I was bleeding from one eye when he tried to gouge at me, and he drew blood trying to bite my arm

I dont know much of his life, as I said his parents have never really spoken about him other than telling me I could attend a memorial they were having on his birthday (which I didnt)