2 Juveniles May Be Tried as Adults in Fatal Stabbing : Slaying: The youths are among group of four accused of killing one teen-ager and wounding another. One suspect is still at large.

The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department will ask that a 15-year-old Thousand Oaks boy and a 17-year-old Agoura Hills boy be prosecuted as adults in the stabbing death of an LAPD detective’s son, deputies said Wednesday.

Investigators said the two juveniles were among a group of four teen-agers who attacked Mike McLoren and James Farris III, both 16, on Monday, stabbing James to death and wounding Mike, apparently during a botched attempt to steal some of Mike’s property.

Investigators said they are still looking for one of the alleged killers--18-year-old Jason Holland of Thousand Oaks.

The request that the juveniles be tried as adults, as well as the two 18-year-olds, will be made when the case is presented to the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office for prosecution, said Sheriff’s Detective Bill Neumann. If prosecutors agree to the request, they would need approval from a juvenile court judge at a competency hearing.

The four youths--some of whom were identified by local teen-agers as members of a group known as the Gremlins--had recently been stealing property from the “clubhouse” or “fort,” where Mike lives behind his family’s Agoura Hills home, Neumann said. He said it was not clear exactly how many of the suspects belonged to that group, but that the youths seem to have been “wanna-be” gang members.

“They hit the big-time this time,” Neumann said. “If they wanted to be gang members, this is what put them into it.”

Neumann said the four youths had taken Mike McLoren’s property from his “fort.” Other teen-agers said they took stereo and other electronic equipment. On Monday night, they broke into the clubhouse and attacked Mike and his friend James, Neumann said.

The attackers fled in a maroon pickup truck, and James and Mike, who were both unarmed, crawled into the kitchen of the main house with multiple stab wounds, Neumann said. James was pronounced dead at Westlake Medical Center; Mike was taken to UCLA Medical Center. He is expected to recover.

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Tuesday morning, police arrested Brandon Hein, 18, and a 15-year-old at Hein’s Oak Park home. That afternoon, a 17-year-old Agoura Hills youth surrendered at the Lost Hills sheriff’s station, accompanied by his attorney and family members.

All three were booked on suspicion of murder.

Both James and Mike were sophomores at Agoura High School, but officials said none of the suspects attended that school. Hein was a student at Oak Park High School--one of Ventura County’s top academic institutions--until March, 1994, when he transferred to Oak View, the district’s alternative high school, officials said. Two months ago, Hein dropped out of Oak View when he turned 18, officials said.

Oak View Principal Cliff Moore declined to comment on the reason for Hein’s transfer: “That is a question a number of people have asked, but I need to keep private,” he said.

The 15-year-old Thousand Oaks boy arrested Tuesday was also an Oak Park High School student before transferring to Oak View last fall, school officials said.

Deputies’ statements that youths in the upper-middle-class suburbs near the Los Angeles-Ventura county border appeared to want to emulate gang members surprised some residents of the area.

Sheriff’s juvenile division detectives said only a handful of youths belong to such groups, stressing that the Agoura area is still relatively free of crime or gang troubles.

“They like to think they’re hard-core gangsters--of Agoura,” said one Agoura High School sophomore, chortling. The student, who wouldn’t give his name, said Holland and the 15-year-old suspect were well known for strutting around the area, acting tough.

Friends of Jason Holland at Indian Hills continuation school in Calabasas--where he spent a semester until dropping out when he turned 18 this year--said he and the younger boy liked to act tough, but couldn’t believe they’d kill anyone.

“They were just kind of bullies,” said eighth-grader Johnny Rose, “but they wouldn’t even pull a knife on anybody.”

“I don’t think anybody that I know out here is capable of taking anyone’s life,” added 18-year-old Sadie Varner.

Deputy Mike Berg, a detective in the Lost Hills sheriff’s juvenile division, said groups such as the Gremlins--which he called “wanna-bes”--usually aren’t violent in typical gang fashion. “They’re not together so much for pride, or to have their homies to hang with, or for turf,” Berg said.

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“Your guess is as good as mine as to why someone would want to emulate [the] behavior” of urban street gangs, he added.

Students at Indian Hills suggested some reasons: “To have fun, or maybe for protection,” Varner said.

“Just to be popular and show that they rule,” Johnny Rose said.

Blinky Rodriguez, a Van Nuys activist who organized the San Fernando Valley gang truce last year, said that given the way music and the media idealize violence, it isn’t surprising some suburban teen-agers are imitating gang members in poorer neighborhoods.

“It’s depicted everywhere you look,” he said.