Federal prosecutors are crediting a recent law change with their ability to federally charge a Burnsville woman who bought the firearms used to kill three first responders.

Thursday afternoon, Ashley Dyrdahl made her first appearance in federal court, where she faces many charges, including conspiracy, lying while registering for a firearm, and straw purchasing. She pleaded not guilty.

“Dyrdahl intentionally and repeatedly obtained powerful and dangerous firearms and put them in the hands of a violent convicted felon,” United States Attorney Andrew Luger said.

Luger is talking about Shannon Gooden, the man prosecutors say was the shooter who killed Matthew Ruge, Paul Elmstrand and Adam Finseth.

The indictment alleges Dyrdahl purchased the two semi-automatic AR-15-style rifles used by Gooden in the deadly February encounter.

It also states the two knew what they were doing was illegal — at one point Dyrdahl texted Gooden, “We just gotta make sure we’re smart about all this ya know?”

Prosecutors leaned on a recent change in federal law in their charging decisions — the bipartisan law is known as The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. A key element of it is creating the straw purchasing crime. Before, they could only charge for people lying when registering for a gun.

“We’re grateful for the existence of this statute,” Luger said, adding, “The other thing the statute did was expand the potential penalties to 15 years, prior statures had not done so.”