Accomplice to Murder Will Serve Long Term : Crime: The man who drove the getaway car after the robbery-shooting of a 73-year-old Torrance businessman is sentenced to 26 years to life.

A robber who drove the getaway car after an accomplice shot a 73-year-old Torrance businessman to death last year pleaded guilty Tuesday to first-degree murder and was sentenced to 26 years to life in state prison.

Kevin Kritz, 25, pleaded guilty to the charge in return for an agreement by prosecutors to drop additional allegations that could have resulted in a life prison sentence with no possibility of parole, Deputy Dist. Atty. Ralph Shapiro said.

Shapiro described Kritz as “probably the least culpable” of the three men accused of murdering Sanford Fineman on Aug. 31 as Fineman prepared to take the day’s receipts from the Torrance auto leasing firm he managed to a local bank. The man who confessed to pulling the trigger was a homeless man befriended by Fineman earlier in the year.

Kritz has asserted since the day of the shooting that he had no idea any killing would take place.

“He knew they were going to do a robbery, but I don’t think he really anticipated a murder,” Shapiro said. “He didn’t go out looking for murder. He was just looking for money.”

Kritz, who most likely will not be eligible for parole for at least two decades, confessed his role to police shortly after he was arrested, Shapiro said.

Kritz’s attorney, James Hallett, said the sentence “is a little heavy, considering his participation and background,” but acknowledged that it was the mandatory term for someone convicted of first-degree murder.

“The idea of killing is just completely outside (Kritz’s) bailiwick,” Hallett said. “He’s stunned that this guy is dead, and he’s stunned that he’s going to prison, essentially for life.”

Transient John Welker, 30, admitted to a Torrance Superior Court judge late last year that he was the one who shot Fineman twice in the head and then took $400 in cash from the dying man’s pockets. Welker, who avoided the death penalty with his guilty plea to murder, was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

According to statements Welker and Kritz made to police, Kritz and a third man gave Welker the gun he used during the robbery and arranged to drive him from the scene afterward. The third suspect, Hector Cardenas, 25, is scheduled for trial in Torrance Superior Court later this month.

Fineman met Welker last May and told friends that he felt sorry for him because he was homeless. Fineman put Welker up in a motel room for a few days and offered him an after-hours cleaning job at the leasing business.

Within a month, however, Fineman fired Welker for stealing from the store, co-workers said.

By then, however, Welker knew that Fineman made a habit of carrying the day’s cash receipts to the bank each evening. In a taped confession after the shooting, Welker said he, Cardenas and Kritz staked out Fineman’s car in a Del Amo Fashion Center parking lot Aug. 31, waiting for him to make his nightly drive to the bank.

When Fineman got in the car, Welker jumped into the passenger side and forced Fineman to drive to a nearby Capitol Bank parking lot. Welker told police that he demanded money; Fineman grabbed for the gun, and it went off.

Police officers in a nearby parking lot heard the shots, saw a man run from Fineman’s car to a waiting car, and gave chase, Shapiro said. Welker, who was covered with blood, was caught with Kritz, who was driving the car, and Cardenas less than half a mile from the murder scene. The murder weapon was still in the car, Shapiro said.