Two Teen-Agers Held in Carjacking, Chase

Two teen-age carjacking suspects, believed to be members of a San Gabriel Valley gang, were arrested Wednesday after a 250-mile, 2 1/2-hour chase through three counties that reached speeds up to 105 m.p.h.

The girl and boy took a Honda Accord at knifepoint Tuesday night from a Rosemead man and sped to San Diego and back before pulling into the Monterey Park police station, where they surrendered peacefully to officers at 1:32 a.m. Wednesday, authorities said.

Because they are juveniles, the suspects were identified only as a 15-year-old Vietnamese girl and a 16-year-old Cambodian boy. Both belong to an Asian gang, Sheriff’s Sgt. Robert Stoneman said. They were being held in Juvenile Hall without bail.

Asian gangs have been active in the San Gabriel Valley recently, carjacking luxury cars such as Lexus and Mercedes-Benz models, authorities report. The cars are often stolen on order and shipped by ocean freighters to Taiwan or Germany.

But Detective Frank Gutierrez of the sheriff’s station in Temple City speculated that the brown 1989 Honda taken by a boy and a girl Tuesday night was probably intended for use as a getaway car in a robbery.

“It wasn’t a new one,” Gutierrez said of the car. “It’s not the ones they (usually) target.”

The car was taken at 10:20 p.m. Tuesday from Hoang Xuan Tran, 29, after he drove into his driveway in the 4500 block of Livia Avenue in Rosemead.

The boy ran up to Tran, grabbed his shirt from behind and pressed a knife against his stomach, Stoneman said. Tran gave up his wallet with $17 in cash and his car keys. The girl got behind the wheel and the two assailants fled.

About 11 p.m., a sheriff’s deputy spotted the Honda, with the male driving, near Rosemead Boulevard and Garvey Avenue in South El Monte. The car sped off when the deputy tried to pull it over.

The Honda entered the Long Beach Freeway and headed south to the Artesia Freeway, then east to the Santa Ana Freeway. When it reached San Diego, it turned around and sped back.

Deputies could not say why the two pulled into the police station and surrendered.