The U.S. Justice Department next week will meet with lawyers for families of victims of two fatal Boeing (BA.N), opens new tab 737 MAX crashes that killed 346 people in 2018 and 2019, as the government decides whether to move ahead with a criminal case, according to correspondence Reuters reviewed.

The meeting, set for Tuesday afternoon, comes ahead of an April 24 gathering scheduled for the victims' families themselves to confer with Justice Department officials.

"As we have ... done previously, we think it would be productive to hold a lawyers-only meeting approximately two weeks before the conferral," said Glenn Leon, the Justice Department's fraud section chief, in an email to lawyers for victims' families Reuters reviewed.