The Public Prosecutor General at the Federal Court of Justice (german: Generalbundesanwalt or ''Generalbundesanwältin beim Bundesgerichtshof'' (GBA), lit.: "General Federal Attorney at the Federal Court of Justice") is the federal

prosecutor A prosecutor is a legal representative of the prosecution in states with either the common law adversarial system or the civil law inquisitorial system. The prosecution is the legal party responsible for presenting the case in a criminal tria ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwee ...

, representing the federal government at the ''

Bundesgerichtshof The Federal Court of Justice (german: Bundesgerichtshof, BGH) is the highest court in the system of ordinary jurisdiction (''ordentliche Gerichtsbarkeit'') in Germany, founded in 1950. It has its seat in Karlsruhe with two panels being situat ...

'', the federal court of justice. The office of the Public Prosecutor General is located in

Karlsruhe Karlsruhe ( , , ; South Franconian: ''Kallsruh'') is the third-largest city of the German state (''Land'') of Baden-Württemberg after its capital of Stuttgart and Mannheim, and the 22nd-largest city in the nation, with 308,436 inhabitants. ...

. Besides its role in appellate cases, the Public Prosecutor General has primary jurisdiction in cases of crimes against the state (in particular

terrorism Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of criminal violence to provoke a state of terror or fear, mostly with the intention to achieve political or religious aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violen ...

espionage Espionage, spying, or intelligence gathering is the act of obtaining secret or confidential information ( intelligence) from non-disclosed sources or divulging of the same without the permission of the holder of the information for a tang ...

and

treason Treason is the crime of attacking a state authority to which one owes allegiance. This typically includes acts such as participating in a war against one's native country, attempting to overthrow its government, spying on its military, its diplo ...

), and offences under the ''

Völkerstrafgesetzbuch The ''Völkerstrafgesetzbuch'' (, "Code of Crimes against International Law"), abbreviated ''VStGB'', is a German law that regulates crimes against (public) international law. It allows cases to be brought against suspects under international c ...

'' (

genocide Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people—usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word (, "race, people") with the ...

crimes against humanity Crimes against humanity are widespread or systemic acts committed by or on behalf of a ''de facto'' authority, usually a state, that grossly violate human rights. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity do not have to take place within the ...

and war crimes). The Public Prosecutor General also represents Germany in certain civil and administrative cases. The Federal Minister of Justice proposes the Public Prosecutor General with the approval of the '' Bundesrat'' to the

President of Germany The president of Germany, officially the Federal President of the Federal Republic of Germany (german: link=no, Bundespräsident der Bundesrepublik Deutschland),The official title within Germany is ', with ' being added in international corres ...

for appointment. The Public Prosecutor General is considered a ''political official''. He is supposed to share the criminal and security policy views and objectives of the respective acting federal government and can be recalled without outspoken reasons at any time. He is subject to the supervision of the Federal Minister of Justice. In 1977, then-Public Prosecutor General

Siegfried Buback Siegfried Buback (3 January 1920, Wilsdruff, Saxony – 7 April 1977, Karlsruhe) was the Attorney General of West Germany from 1974 until his murder in 1977. Life and career Buback studied at the University of Leipzig. From 1940 to 1945, he w ...

was assassinated by an extremist left-wing group, the

Red Army Faction The Red Army Faction (RAF, ; , ),See the section "Name" also known as the Baader–Meinhof Group or Baader–Meinhof Gang (, , active 1970–1998), was a West German far-left Marxist-Leninist urban guerrilla group founded in 1970. The ...

Location, premises

From 1950 until 1998, the office of the Public Prosecutor General shared a building in Karlsruhe with the

(Federal Court of Justice). Since then it is in a new building on the site of the former "Deutsche Waffen- und Munitionsfabrik" erman arms and munitions factory now the Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie (ZKM), designed by Oswald Mathias Ungers.

Organization

The GBA is supported by a Deputy Public Prosecutor General at the Federal Court of Justice (''Stellvertretender Generalbundesanwalt beim Bundesgerichtshof'') and several Federal Prosecutors at the Federal Court of Justice (''Bundesanwälte beim Bundesgerichtshof''), Senior Public Prosecutors at the Federal Court of Justice (''Oberstaatsanwälte beim Bundesgerichtshof'') and Public Prosecutors at the Federal Court of Justice (''Staatsanwälte beim Bundesgerichtshof''). He has a staff of about 300, of whom about 110 are permanently assigned public prosecutors and about 50 public prosecutors or judges from the federal states, who are usually seconded for three years. The office of the Public Prosecutor General at the Federal Court of Justice is organized as follows: * Directorate ZS: central services (5 departments); espionage; crimes under the Foreign Trade and Payments Act, crimes under the War Weapons Control Act, international criminal law (5 departments) * Directorate Appeals: appeals at the Federal Court of Justice (7 departments) * Directorate TE: terrorism (11 departments) Generalbundesanwaltschaft2

List of Public Prosecutors General since 1950

References

External links

* {{Coord, 49, 00, 05, N, 8, 23, 07, E, display=title, region:DE-BW_type:landmark_source:dewiki Judiciary of Germany 1950 establishments in Germany Organisations based in Karlsruhe