Federal prosecutors in Maryland filed notice Friday that they intend to seek the death penalty against three defendants in an MS-13 gang murder case, reversing course amid a directive by President Trump to try to use capital punishment more often.

The case, which involves two murders and four attempted murders, has been pending since 2022. A trial is set for later this year. Under the the Biden administration, the federal Department of Justice was not pursuing the death penalty against the defendants.

But Trump issued an executive order in January, directing the U.S. attorney general to seek the death penalty “for all crimes of a severity demanding its use,” including mandating that it be sought for all cases involving the killing of a law enforcement officer or those committed by undocumented immigrants.

U.S. District Judge Stephanie A. Gallagher wrote last week that the Justice Department had reopened two pending Maryland cases for capital review in April, and that she wanted prosecutors to let her know by today about their plans.

In her request, Gallagher, who was nominated by Trump during his first term in 2019, indicated she wasn’t necessarily saying she would allow the government to proceed in their death penalty efforts.

“The setting of this deadline does not suggest or imply that the Court believes any such change in position would be legally permissible or timely. The deadline is intended only to permit this issue to be litigated” before trials, Gallagher wrote.

In the notice, prosecutors said they now intend to seek the death penalty against alleged MS-13 members Wilson Arturo Constanza-Galdomez, 25; Edis Omar Valenzuela-Rodriguez, 25; and Jonathan Pesquera-Puerto, 24.

They are not seeking it against a fourth defendant in the case, Wualter Orellana-Hernandez, who pleaded guilty in October to one count of participating in racketeering conspiracy, but has not been sentenced.

All of the men lived in Baltimore.

In a court filing Friday, prosecutors said that the defendants “committed the offense in an especially heinous, cruel, or depraved manner in that it involved torture or serious physical abuse to the victim,” as well as citing the ages of the victims.

Pesquera-Puerto’s attorney, Tyler L. Mann, declined to comment Friday, as did Valenzuela-Rodriguez’s attorney Richard Bardos. The attorney for Constanza-Galdomez did not return a message seeking comment.

Constanza-Galdomez and Pesquera-Puerto were allegedly members or associates of the Carlington Locos Salvatrucha clique, while Valenzuela-Rodriguez and Orellana-Hernandez were allegedly members of the Huntington Criminales Locos Salvatrucha clique.

The indictment alleges that from June 2019 through at least October 2021, the defendants participated in the racketeering activities of MS-13, including two murders, four attempted murders, drug trafficking offenses, and witness tampering.

Authorities allege in May 2020, the suspects lured Gabriela Alejandra Gonzalez Ardon, 16, of New York, to the Loch Raven Reservoir in Baltimore County, where she was murdered. The indictment says the motive for the homicide was a belief by the men that Ardon had been associating with rival gang members.

Then in June of the same year, the men allegedly lured 18-year-old Michelle Tenezaca to CSX tracks in Southeast Baltimore and stabbed her to death. Her sister was also attacked but survived, while the sister’s boyfriend was found stabbed near the waterfront in Turner Station, according to prosecutors. He too survived.

The indictment alleges that the defendants also conspired to sell marijuana, cocaine and fentanyl to raise funds for MS-13 to purchase drugs and weapons, sending proceeds to associates in Maryland and El Salvador.

As of Gallagher’s deadline of noon Friday, the government had not indicated whether it will seek the death penalty in the second case, in which defendant Matthew Hightower is charged with ordering the killing of a witness in a health care fraud case, which led to the mistaken-identity killing of a teacher’s aide who lived next door. Hightower’s trial is just weeks away.