'He never heard my warning,' slain man's partner testifies

LARGO -- The driver of the armored truck saw a man in a hooded sweat shirt and dark clothes sprint toward his partner, who was carrying a bag stuffed with cash.

The warning Dietmar Janssen had been trained to give as a driver for Dunbar Armored Car Service was simple: Honk the horn and hope your partner hears before a robber approaches. This time, it didn't matter.

The robber raised a gun to courier Donald Brennan's head and pulled the trigger without hesitation, grabbing a bag with $10,000 before Brennan even fell.

"He never heard my warning," a tearful Janssen testified on Tuesday. "I tried."

Testimony in the first-degree murder trial of the man accused of killing the armored car courier in October 1999 opened Tuesday. Nathan John Brinkley, 25, a former football player at Northeast High School, is accused of killing Brennan as the 47-year-old Army veteran made a cash pickup at a Chili's Grill and Bar in St. Petersburg.

Brinkley, who worked for about a month as a dishwasher at the same Chili's, faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole if convicted. Prosecutors are not seeking the death penalty.

Janssen, 58, lost his composure as prosecutor Beverly Andringa gently asked him to recount the shooting for jurors. He covered his face and wept.

Janssen later told jurors that he had left the security business and sought counseling.

He said the robber grabbed a money bag carried by Brennan almost at the same time as the shot rang out.

"He did it in a perfect way," said Janssen, who was trained to stay in the truck during a robbery.

Andringa told jurors during her opening statement that Brinkley had borrowed his girlfriend's Toyota Tercel to rob Brennan. A nearby business owner saw him flee from the scene in it, she said.

Brinkley was tied to the area by cell phones calls he made shortly before the robbery, police said.

Brinkley hid some money in a toilet tank and began to spend some of the cash. He brought the Tercel into a garage for repairs. He rented a car. He bought alcohol.

Police arrested Brinkley within a day of the killing after a Chili's manager identified him based on a police composite drawing. When arrested, Brinkley had up to $7,000 cash, Andringa said.

The prosecutor said Brinkley lied to police about where he got all the money, saying he won it.

But Andringa said Brinkley finally told police he killed Brennan.

Assistant Public Defender Chris Helinger, however, said St. Petersburg police got the answers they were looking for by using coercive interrogation techniques.

"They tried everything they could to get him to say he committed the crime," she said in opening statements.

As to all the cash Brinkley had on him when he was arrested, Helinger said her client was a drug dealer used to carrying lots of money. He also gambled, she said.

The trial continues today and is expected to last two to three weeks.

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