Teens Accused in Claes Killing to Be Kept in Custody : Courts: A juvenile judge refuses to release any of the four youths to parents while they await trial in the slaying of the 14-year-old Tustin boy. Two might be tried as adults.

A Juvenile Court judge refused Wednesday to release the four teen-agers accused in the slaying of 14-year-old Carl Dan Claes to the custody of their parents, ordering them to remain in juvenile hall.

*

Presiding Judge Frank S. Fasel also set a July 14 hearing to determine whether the two youths facing murder charges--Thomas (Tommy) Miller, 16, and Jason Merritt, 17--should be tried as adults.

The hearing Wednesday was held after several delays in finding attorneys for Miller and his 15-year-old brother, both of whom have juvenile records.

Tommy Miller has been represented by both the public defender’s office and the independent juvenile defenders. The public defender’s office has also represented Miller’s younger brother, who is charged as an accessory after the fact in Claes’ murder.

The brothers’ past brushes with the law pose a potential conflict of interest for attorneys who cannot represent one brother when their office previously represented another.

Fasel set a hearing for Tuesday to determine whether Deputy Public Defender Leonard Gumlia should continue representing Tommy Miller.

According to investigators, Claes was shot to death May 16 in a dispute over a $2,500 sound system. A Lemon Heights resident found his body the next morning in a Lemon Heights ditch three miles from his Tustin home.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Carolyn Kirkwood filed charges against Merritt on Tuesday, making him the fourth suspect charged in the case.

Law enforcement officials believe they have now detained all the key figures in Claes’ killing, but Kirkwood said Wednesday that investigators are continuing to interview other teens who may have been peripherally involved.

Merritt’s attorney argued Wednesday that his client, accused of driving the shooter to the murder scene, has no prior record and should be released to his mother’s custody.

“He’s local, his mother and grandparents are here,” attorney William A. Elliott told the judge. “There’s no place else for this kid to go.”

Gumlia made a similar unsuccessful plea on behalf of his client.

“The court has seen the parents. They have been here at every hearing,” Gumlia said. “They have assured me they would keep a close eye on Thomas Miller, and at this point the allegations against him are just that.”

The judge, without comment, denied the motions to release the accused teen-agers.

Court records show that Merritt’s father left Orange County and moved to Wisconsin to live with his parents before Jason was born. When Jason was less than a month old, Margaret Merritt filed suit against her husband seeking $150 a month in child support, the records show.

It is unclear whether his mother, unemployed and living on welfare at the time, ever received that support.

Bob Acosta, an uncle of Merritt’s, said in an interview Wednesday that he is a “great kid,”--an industrious worker who has always helped his mother, getting a restaurant job to assist with the family bills and taking care of his younger brother.

“He’s always trying to better himself,” Acosta said, “to get a better job and work his way up.”

Another 17-year-old who had been living with the Millers has been charged with being an accessory to murder after the fact and receiving a stolen gun and Claes’ pager from Miller after the slaying.

Fasel scheduled pretrial hearings for that 17-year-old and Miller’s 15-year-old brother for June 16, when a trial date will likely be scheduled.

The Probation Department will now review Miller and Merritt’s prior records, how they responded to juvenile justice in the past, their family histories and the sophistication of the crime they are now accused of in order to determine whether they should be tried as adults.