• Gang members fitted for new prosthetic legs in San Salvador

    Jose Cabezas / AFP - Getty Images

    Mara Salvatrucha gang member Noelio Calderon is attended by a technician to repair his prosthesis in a non profit organization on San Salvador, El Salvador, on May 29. Four imprisoned gang members are having their prosthesis repaired in order to imporve their quality of life as part of the benefits of the truce between gangs and the government.

    Luis Romero / AP

    Shackled inmate Noelio Calderon, a member of the Mara Salvatrucha gang, adjusts his old prosthetic leg at a clinic where he is getting measured for a new one in San Salvador, El Salvador.

    Ulises Rodriguez / Reuters

    Jailed member of street gang Mara Salvatrucha, Santos Benitez Sanchez, 44, who lost his left leg during a fight against a rival gang, waits to be fitted with a prosthetic leg at the clinic of the Salvadoran Handicapped Organization in San Salvador on May 29.

    Jose Cabezas / AFP - Getty Images

    Mara Salvatrucha gang member Santos Benito Sanchez is attended by a technician to repair his prosthesis in a non profit organization on San Salvador.

    Four members of the street gang Mara Salvatrucha are having their prosthetic legs repaired or replaced on May 29 as a part of an initiative to improve their quality of life.

    The plan to fit disabled gang inmates with prosthetic limbs is part of a peace process between gangs and the government, pushed by the Catholic Church.

    Around 160 jailed Maras, or gang, members require prostheses for their handicaps, according to the Salvadoran Handicapped Organization.

    --msnbc.com wire services contributed to this blog post

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  • Ulises Rodriguez / Reuters

    An inmate and member of a gang holds his son at the jail in Quetzaltepeque, El Salvador on May 2, 2012.

    El Salvador gangs declare schools off-limits in expansion of truce

    Representatives of El Salvador's notorious Mara Salvatrucha and Mara 18 gangs have announced an expansion of the terms of their recent truce, calling a halt to the recruitment of children and youths and declaring schools off-limits for their activities.

    Last month the Central American country, which has one of the highest homicide rates in the world, had its first murder-free day in nearly three years.

    -- Reuters and Agence France Presse contributed to this report

  • Guatemalan villagers form vigilante group against Salvatrucha gang

    Jorge Dan Lopez / Reuters

    An armed villager guards the entrance to the village of Castanas, on the outskirts of Guatemala City, on July 19. The villagers formed an armed group to defend themselves in response to an extortion threat last Friday by the Mara Salvatrucha criminal gang, according to the leader of the armed villagers. There was no official comment from the local authorities.

    Johan Ordonez / AFP - Getty Images

    Hooded men look for members of the Salvatrucha gang on board a bus in Castanas, a neighborhood on the southern outskirts of Guatemala City, on July 19.

    Johan Ordonez / AFP - Getty Images

    Hooded men interrogate a man, suspected to belong to the Salvatrucha gang, in Castanas on July 19.

    Johan Ordonez / AFP - Getty Images

    Hooded men stand guard at the entrance to the Castanas neighborhood on July 19.

    See more images of Guatemala on PhotoBlog.

  • Raul Arboleda / AFP - Getty Images

    A police officer shows a M-26 hand grenade found mixed in a box of tomatoes, during a presentation to the press at the police station in Medellin, Antioquia department, Colombia, on May 19. The Colombian Police seized thirty M-26 hand grenades which were hidden in three boxes of tomatoes that allegedly belonged to the criminal gangs.

    Colombian Police seize hand grenades found in boxes of tomatoes

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  • Johan Ordonez / AFP - Getty Images

    Members of Mara 18 street gang gesture while inside a maximum security cell within the Torre de Tribunales courthouse in Guatemala City on March 30, 2011. The gang members were sentenced to 47 years in prison for the murder of Jorge Winter, a teacher at the Etapa II correctional facility, during a riot.

    Guatemalan gang members flash signs while being sentenced to nearly 50 years in prison for murder

    Related to gangs in Guatemala, here's a story about drug trafficking there and another today about the United States working with Guatemalan agents in the arrest of a drug trafficker.

  • Ed Andrieski / AP

    Tiffany Hartley speaks at a rally at the Capitol in Denver on March 30, 2011, where she demanded that the U.S. government do more to find the body of her husband, David Hartley, who was presumably gunned down on a lake along the Texas - Mexico border.

    Colorado woman pleads for help in finding the body of her murdered husband

    AP reports
    DENVER — A Colorado woman is demanding that the U.S. government do more to find the body of her husband, six months after he was presumably gunned down on a lake along Texas' border with Mexico.

    Tiffany Hartley, who lives east of Greeley in Weld County, said nothing has been done since Mexican officials called off a search for David Hartley on Oct. 14. She held a rally with family and supporters at the Colorado Capitol on Wednesday asking state officials to pressure the Obama administration to do more to find her husband and to secure the border.

    Tiffany Hartley told authorities she and her husband were using personal watercraft on Falcon Lake when they were approached Sept. 30 by Mexican pirates who shot and killed her husband. The couple were returning to Texas after photographing a historic church on the Mexican side of the lake, Hartley said.

    "We don't want to leave him in the hands of the enemy," she told The Associated Press, referring to suspected pirates or drug smugglers known to roam the lake about 45 miles northwest of McAllen, Texas. "If we get his body back, we can at last honor him the way he would want to be honored, at least by his family."

    No death certificate has been issued, and Mexican officials have told Hartley the case remains open.

    Click here for the full story.

  • Cricket team from Compton to tour Australia

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    Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images

    Emilio Cazarez practices his swing in the nets during a training session with his Compton Homies and Popz cricket teammates at Woodley Cricket Field on January 28, 2011 in Los Angeles, California. The team, comprised of African Americans and Latinos, was formed to provide an alternative to gang activities that ruled their Compton neighborhoods. The team will tour Australia for two weeks, playing three matches in Sydney and three more in Melbourne, including a Twenty20 match against the Johnny Mullagh Indigenous XI, as well as taking part in various fundraising activities specially helping raise funds for Australian flood victims.

    Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images

    Ricardo Salgado, who is on parole and cannot travel with the team to Australia, shows his tattoos after a training session with his Compton Homies and Popz cricket teammates.