The Public Prosecutor General at the Federal Court of Justice ( or ''GBA ) is the federal

prosecutor A prosecutor is a legal representative of the prosecution in states with either the adversarial system, which is adopted in common law, or inquisitorial system, which is adopted in Civil law (legal system), civil law. The prosecution is the ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

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

Karlsruhe Karlsruhe ( ; ; ; South Franconian German, South Franconian: ''Kallsruh'') is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, third-largest city of the States of Germany, German state of Baden-Württemberg, after its capital Stuttgart a ...

. 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 violence against non-combatants to achieve political or ideological aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violence during peacetime or in the context of war aga ...

espionage Espionage, spying, or intelligence gathering, as a subfield of the intelligence field, is the act of obtaining secret or confidential information ( intelligence). A person who commits espionage on a mission-specific contract is called an ...

and

treason Treason is the crime of attacking a state (polity), state authority to which one owes allegiance. This typically includes acts such as participating in a war against one's native country, attempting to Coup d'état, overthrow its government, spy ...

), 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 violence that targets individuals because of their membership of a group and aims at the destruction of a people. Raphael Lemkin, who first coined the term, defined genocide as "the destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group" by ...

crimes against humanity Crimes against humanity are certain serious crimes committed as part of a large-scale attack against civilians. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity can be committed during both peace and war and against a state's own nationals as well as ...

and

war crimes A war crime is a violation of the laws of war that gives rise to individual criminal responsibility for actions by combatants in action, such as intentionally killing civilians or intentionally killing prisoners of war, torture, taking hos ...

). 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 titled the Federal President of the Federal Republic of Germany (),The official title within Germany is ', with ' being added in international correspondence; the official English title is President of the F ...

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 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 ( ), was a West German far-left militant group founded in 1970 and active until 1998, considered a terrorist organisat ...

Location, premises

From 1950 until 1998, the office of the Public Prosecutor General shared a building in Karlsruhe with the Bundesgerichtshof (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 Oswald Mathias Ungers (12 July 1926 – 30 September 2007) was a German architect and architectural theorist, known for his rationalist designs and the use of cubic forms. Among his notable projects are museums in Frankfurt, Hamburg and Cologn ...

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 West Germany Organisations based in Karlsruhe