Armed Pair Invade Home, Tie Up 2 Girls : Crime: The theft is interrupted when the bound teen-agers’ parents return home. Suspects are at large.

Two men brandishing handguns burst into a home here, tied up two teen-age girls and began searching their house for valuables late Saturday, police said.

As the robbers rummaged through the house in the 700 block of Patterson Avenue, the girls’ parents returned, interrupting the theft.

The intruders then pistol-whipped the girls’ mother and fled through a rear door as the father ran after them, police said.

The father got into his car and pursued the men onto the Ventura Freeway. He followed them as far as the Golden State Freeway interchange, but abandoned the chase when they began firing at his car.

“They fired on him as they were driving, so he backed off,” said Sgt. Russ Pierce, of the Glendale Police Department.

Authorities said shots also were fired inside the house, but no one was injured. The name of the family was not released.

Authorities are still looking for the suspects, police said. The robbers were described as men of Asian descent between the ages of 18 and 22. They were driving a dark, imported vehicle.

Police said an estimate of the family’s loss had not been determined.

The Glendale incident is the latest in a series of home-invasion-style robberies that police believe originated in Orange and Los Angeles counties. Chinese and Vietnamese gangs targeted other Asians they believed had money, authorities said.

Most of the home-invasion-style robberies have occurred in the San Gabriel Valley, police said, but are slowly moving into the San Fernando Valley area.

Just last month, three families in Northridge, Van Nuys and Granada Hills were tied up as robbers and gang members ransacked their homes, taking thousands of dollars in valuables.

In some cases, the thieves raped the victims.