SECOND L.A. GANG LIST SUSPECT NABBED IN BAJA.

Byline: RACHEL URANGA and RICK ORLOV

Staff Writers

When the feds finally caught up to him, "Big Steve" wasn't so big anymore.

Licking an ice cream cone in Rosarito Beach, Mexico, Steve Alex Garcia -- the San Fernando Valley parolee listed as one of L.A.'s Most Wanted gang members -- was 50 pounds lighter than in his gangbanging days.

He was working on a fishing boat and renting a room in the Baja resort city, just a 30-minute drive from San Diego, said John Clark, head of the U.S. Marshals Pacific Southwest Regional Fugitive Task Force.

But last Friday, his days on the run from a murder charge ended when the task force nabbed him.

"I hope he didn't get a chance to finish that ice cream," Police Chief William Bratton said Tuesday at a City Hall news conference with Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announcing the arrest.

A member of the San Fers gang from San Fernando, Garcia, 43, also known as "Loco Steve," was wanted in the 2001 shooting death of fellow gang member Kenneth Landon in Sylmar.

His arrest marks the second in a week of a suspect included on the Los Angeles Police Department's new Most Wanted list. Last week, Angel Zevallos, 22, was captured in Guatemala City.

Bratton and Villaraigosa said they were unsure whether the $50,000 reward now being offered for those on the Most Wanted list played a role in the arrests.

"We don't know what the reason was, but I don't think it's a coincidence that we arrested two people on our Most Wanted list once the rewards were offered," the mayor said.

Under a gang crackdown announced in February, the LAPD for the first time began identifying members and their gang affiliations by name. Bratton said the move has led to more tips even though gang experts say giving gangsters notoriety is a bad idea.

Garcia's relatives said they were surprised to hear of his capture. Though he had a criminal record dating back two decades and police say he was a known gang member, family members described him as a "teddy bear" who never managed to gain control of his life.

He dropped out of high school, worked odd construction jobs, moved around often. He had two children, now 11 and 13.

"He wasn't heavy into gangs. He was painted out to be a big gangster," said Tony Vargas, his 31-year-old nephew. "He is just from San Fernando, and when you are from San Fernando you are a homeboy for life."

Garcia had no family in Mexico and did not grow up speaking Spanish, though police said he learned it living south of the border.

Garcia is accused of shooting Landon about 1:30 a.m. Feb. 12, 2001, after a dispute at a Motel 6 in the 12700 block of Encinitas Avenue, police said.

For 17 months -- long before Villaraigosa named him to the top 10 list -- federal and local officials had been searching for Garcia. Last week, their four-day surveillance operation in Rosarito ended when they spotted him along Avenida Benito Juarez, the city's main street.

They had been watching a market he was said to patronize when they finally nabbed him at the ice-cream stand.

Garcia, also wanted for parole violations for discharging a firearm, was deported to the U.S. and taken to Chino State Prison.

With the arrest, police added a new suspect to the Most Wanted list: Arash Semerome Safaie, 32, a member of the Hardtimes street gang, suspected in the 2001 shooting of a 17-year-old girl. Safaei is also suspected in two other shootings, police said.

Zevallos, the suspect arrested last week, was captured in Guatemala City, where police were investigating an unrelated kidnapping and received a tip that a tattooed man was bragging about a shooting in L.A.

Zevallos, a Peruvian national, is suspected of wounding a security guard at the Buddha Bar in Hollywood on Feb. 9, 2006. Police said the guard survived but never fully recovered.

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(color) Steve Alex Garcia, wanted in a 2001 gang slaying in Sylmar, was eating and ice cream cone in Baja at the time of his arrest.