Attorney General William Barr directed the Bureau of Prisons to schedule the executions of four federal death row inmates convicted of murdering children.

Barr, who last summer announced new guidelines for resuming capital punishment under federal law following a hiatus stemming back to 2003, said Monday that the four convicted child murderers — two of whom had also raped their victims — will receive the death penalty in July and August. They will be the first federal executions in nearly two decades.