SA man jailed for fatal punch

A young man has been jailed for six years for fatally punching a father who was about to return to his fiancee and toddler in the Netherlands.

Jason Graham Bridgland, 22, was found guilty of manslaughter by Justice David Peek in the South Australian Supreme Court in 2013.

Henk van Oosterom, 39, was punched in the Bushman Hotel carpark in Gawler, north of Adelaide, in the early hours of September 1, 2012.

Mr van Oosterom had been preparing to return to the Netherlands to marry his partner, with whom he had a daughter.

At the time, Bridgland was on a bond for an assault after punching and kneeing a man in the face, leaving him disfigured.

Judge Peek on Friday set a six-year maximum term for the manslaughter, and added nine months for the assault for which he had earlier been given a suspended sentence.

He set a non-parole period of five years and three months.

Another man and a youth were found not guilty of manslaughter, with Judge Peek rejecting the crown's submission that the trio were involved in a joint enterprise to assault Mr van Oosterom.

Judge Peek said that while the victim had thrown a punch, Bridgland was in full control of his faculties and could have retreated.