Federal Court of Justice

Federal Court of Justice
Bundesgerichtshof
Established	1 October 1950 (1950-10-01)
Jurisdiction	Federal Republic of Germany
Location	Karlsruhe and Leipzig
Composition method	Election by Judicial Selection Committee
Authorized by	Basic Law of Germany
Number of positions	153 judges (as of 15 January 2023)
Language	German
Website	bundesgerichtshof.de
President
Currently	Bettina Limperg [de]
Since	1 July 2014
Vice President
Currently	Jürgen Ellenberger [de]
Since	2 December 2016

The Federal Court of Justice (German: Bundesgerichtshof pronounced [ˌbʊndəsɡəˈʁɪçt͡shoːf] ^ⓘ, BGH) is the highest court of civil and criminal jurisdiction in Germany. Its primary responsibility is the final appellate review of decisions by lower courts for errors of law. While, legally, a decision by the Federal Court of Justice is only binding with respect to the individual case in which it enters, de facto the court's interpretation of the law is followed by lower courts with almost no exception.^[1] Decisions handed down by the Federal Court of Justice can only be vacated by the Federal Constitutional Court for violating a provision of the German constitution, the Basic Law.

In addition to the court's appellate duties, a few judges of the Federal Court of Justice act as investigating judges in criminal investigations led by the Public Prosecutor General for a small number of exceptional offenses (such as crimes against humanity and the formation of terrorist organisations). As such, they are responsible for issuing search and arrest warrants, among other things.

The German legal order has different supreme courts for the different branches of its judiciary. The four sister supreme courts of the Federal Court of Justice are the Federal Administrative Court (for administrative matters), the Federal Fiscal Court (for tax matters), the Federal Labor Court (for matters of labour law), and the Federal Social Court (for social security matters).

The seat of the Federal Court of Justice is in Karlsruhe, Baden-Württemberg. Two criminal divisions of the court are based in Leipzig, Saxony.^[2]