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Ferdinand von Schirach (born 1964, Munich) is a German criminal defense lawyer and crime writer.

Life and work
Von Schirach was born in 1964 to the businessman Robert von Schirach (1938–1980) and his wife Elke (née Fähndrich, b. 1942). His grandfather was Baldur von Schirach, leader of the Hitler Youth. Von Schirach was raised in Munich and Trossingen and attended the Kolleg St. Blasien.

After studying jurisprudence in Bonn and completing his referendary in Cologne and Berlin, he established himself as a lawyer specializing in criminal law. He became a "celebrity lawyer" by representing clients such as the BND spy Norbert Juretzko and politician Günter Schabowski in the so-called "Politburo trial". He was active in the 2008 Liechtenstein tax affair, when he brought charges against the BND. Schirach remains active as a lawyer.

In 2009 he published his first book, Verbrechen (published in English as Crime: Stories), a collection of short stories based on cases he was involved in. It spent 54 weeks on the bestseller list of Der Spiegel. The rights to Verbrechen were bought by publishers in over 30 countries, including Éditions Gallimard in France, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. in the United States, Chatto and Windus in England, and Salamandra in Spain. Constantin Film bought the film rights to the book, and in 2012 Doris Dörrie based the film Glück on a story from Verbrechen. Verbrechen was also made into a miniseries on ZDF that starred Josef Bierbichler as Friedrich Leonhardt, an attorney character based on Schirach.

Honors

 * 2010: Stern des Jahres für Literatur, Munich Abendzeitung
 * 2010: Kleist Prize for Verbrechen
 * 2010: Nominated for the Deutscher Reporterpreis in the essay category
 * 2011: Berliner Bär for Literature
 * 2011: Nominated for the Deutscher Reporterpreis in the essay category
 * 2011: Nominated for the Prix Médicis