Deutschland prison guides

Prisons in Germany: JVA guides, visits, and how Auskunft really works

Germany has no national jail roster. Each Land runs its own Justizvollzug, and a Berlin enquiry desk will not tell you if someone is in Bavaria. These pages walk families through the actual Auskunft route and the large houses people search for by name — Tegel, Moabit, Stadelheim, Stammheim — without pretending a Google-style inmate list exists. Germany’s first-level map is the 16 Länder.

Why you will not find a German “inmate search”

Justizvollzug is a state (Land) competence. There is no federal website that dumps names. Berlin’s Zentrale Auskunftsstelle will talk you through addresses and visit rules on the phone, but it will only discuss a named prisoner in writing, and only when the Justizvollzugsdatenschutzgesetz allows it. Other Länder have their own post boxes. A request sent to the wrong state simply comes back empty.

Remand (Untersuchungshaft) adds a second lock: the prosecutor or the court may have to issue a Sprechschein before a family visit. That is a court process, not a website form. Mixing this up with a US booking log is how people lose a week.

How visits usually work

The prisoner typically has to apply for the visit. Capacity is tight — Tegel’s standard slot is about forty minutes, a few times a month; Moabit splits remand and sentenced rules and closes to social visits on Fridays and weekends. Munich (Stadelheim) wants at least one working day’s notice. Always carry a passport or national ID; a driving licence is often not enough.

Each JVA page on this site is about that house: the street, the S-Bahn or U-Bahn that actually drops you at the wall, and the official page for Besucher. We do not copy one “Germany hub” paragraph onto every prison.

How Germany is carved up on this site

Germany (Deutschland) is a separate country folder — not a tab on a mixed European roster, and not a US state code. The analogue of a US state here is the first-level unit: Länder (federal states). Germany’s first-level map is the 16 Länder. Justizvollzug is a Land job. Bavaria will not answer a Berlin Auskunft, and NRW will not confirm a Hamburg JVA. Each Land page on this site is its own article — not a cloned ‘German state’ blurb. Open a Land page when you already know the slice of Germany; stay on this hub when you need the national rules, the official locator, and the list of those units.

A JVA holds remand (Untersuchungshaft) and sentenced people under that Land’s statute. Tegel, Moabit, Stadelheim, Stammheim and Köln are the houses families already search. There is no federal inmate spreadsheet. A Sprechschein for U-Haft is a court paper, not a website form. Facility articles under /germany/ are building guides (address, operator, how a visit is booked). They are not who-is-inside tables. If a Land has few prison guides, that is coverage on this site, not an empty prison system. Phoning Tegel because the arrest was ‘in Germany’. Or treating a Dutch PI visiting paper as valid in Kleve. The Land URL is the first filter; the JVA is the second.

Finding someone held in Germany

Germany does not publish a Google-style inmate spreadsheet. Berliner Justizvollzug — Zentrale Auskunftsstelle is the named official route (www.berlin.de/justizvollzug/service/zentrale-auskunftsstelle/). Telephone name checks are usually refused. Written Auskunft goes to the Land that actually holds the person, with a postal return address. Berlin’s Zentrale Auskunftsstelle is a Berlin desk. Send Bavaria to Munich, not to Moabit. German prison administrations do not publish who is in custody. Telephone location checks are usually refused; written Auskunft is gated by each Land’s prison data-protection law. We do not list inmates. Always confirm Besuchszeiten with the JVA before travelling.

A US reader used to sheriff websites will type “Germany inmate search” and find nothing of the kind. That is the law. Court lists, Facebook groups and paid “worldwide jail” products are not Berliner Justizvollzug — Zentrale Auskunftsstelle. If the person was remanded overnight, reception can lag; if they were transferred out of the Land you had in mind, the old desk is the wrong door. Use the Land pages below to stop treating Berlin as a synonym for the whole country.

Visits, money and staying in touch

Visiting in Germany is not a US-style walk-up. The prisoner typically applies. Slots are short — Tegel around forty minutes, a few times a month. Moabit closes social visits on Fridays and weekends. Carry a passport or national ID; a driving licence often fails. Always re-read that JVA’s Besucher page. Where a facility guide on this site quotes hours, they were taken from that establishment’s official page — re-check the day before you travel. This country hub will not invent a national timetable.

Dress codes, dog searches and what you may carry are house rules. Money and remote contact, where they exist, go through the official national channel — not a personal transfer to a cellmate. BER, MUC, FRA, CGN and HAM still leave an S-Bahn or regional last mile. Stadelheim is not Marienplatz. Stammheim is a Stuttgart hill, not the Hauptbahnhof. Cross-border families from Austria, Czechia, Poland or France still follow German ID rules at a German gate.

Travel, borders and the wrong-gate problem

BER, MUC, FRA, CGN and HAM still leave an S-Bahn or regional last mile. Stadelheim is not Marienplatz. Stammheim is a Stuttgart hill, not the Hauptbahnhof. Cross-border families from Austria, Czechia, Poland or France still follow German ID rules at a German gate. Print the gate address from the official prison page, not from a maps pin that only names Berlin or “German prison”. Neighbouring countries on this site have their own URLs; a cheaper flight into the next capital is not a visiting permit.

Phoning Tegel because the arrest was ‘in Germany’. Or treating a Dutch PI visiting paper as valid in Kleve. The Land URL is the first filter; the JVA is the second. If you only know a town name, match it to a Land first, then to a facility guide. Confusing one Land of Germany with another is the most common way to book the wrong visit.

Länder (federal states) of Germany — each on its own URL

Germany is not mixed with the United States or with other European countries. Below is this country’s own first-level map (Länder (federal states)). Open a unit for a longer article on how custody, visits and travel actually work there. US readers looking for a county inmate spreadsheet will not find one: Germany does not publish that, and neither do we.

Länder (federal states)

16 pages, written so Germany does not collapse into a single mixed list. This is the analogue of opening a US state after you choose the United States.

land · StuttgartBaden-WürttembergBaden-WürttembergBaden-Württemberg runs its own prisons from Stuttgart, not from Berlin and not from Munich. Stammheim, Bruchsal, Freiburg and the houses toward Konstanz and the Rhine are Land establishments. There is no national inmate search. A family asks this Land's Justizvollzug, and a Berlin office will not answer for a Stuttgart file.Open this area →land · MunichBavariaBayernBavaria is Germany's largest Land by area, with its own Justizvollzug based on Munich rather than on a federal jail service. Stadelheim, Straubing and the smaller houses are Bavarian answers, not Prussian ones. Nobody can Google a list of people in custody. Auskunft is a Land matter.Open this area →land · BerlinBerlinBerlinBerlin is a city-state, so the prison system is the city. Tegel, Moabit and Plötzensee are the names families already use. The Berliner Justizvollzug handles Auskunft. There is no public list of people in custody, and a phone call to the gate is not how you locate someone.Open this area →land · PotsdamBrandenburgBrandenburgBrandenburg wraps Berlin. Potsdam is the capital, and the prisons families actually hunt are in Brandenburg an der Havel, Cottbus and the smaller towns, not on Unter den Linden. The Land answers its own Auskunft. There is no public inmate list, and Berlin's city desk is the wrong door for a Brandenburg file.Open this area →land · BremenBremenFreie Hansestadt BremenBremen is a two-city Land: the city of Bremen and the port of Bremerhaven, with Lower Saxony in between on the map. JVA Bremen at Oslebshausen is the house. Auskunft is Bremen's, not Hamburg's. There is no public list of people in custody.Open this area →land · HamburgHamburgFreie und Hansestadt HamburgHamburg is a city-state whose prison names are Fuhlsbüttel, Billwerder and Hahnöfersand, not the port terminal and not Schleswig-Holstein. The city runs its own Justizvollzug. There is no public inmate list. Auskunft is a Hamburg request, and a Kiel or Hanover office will not invent an answer.Open this area →land · WiesbadenHesseHessenHesse sits in the middle of Germany, with Wiesbaden as capital and Frankfurt as the city everyone actually flies into. Preungesheim, Weiterstadt, Butzbach and Kassel are different gates. The Land runs Justizvollzug. There is no public inmate list, and a Rhine-Main rumour is not an address.Open this area →land · HanoverLower SaxonyNiedersachsenLower Saxony stretches from the North Sea coast to the Harz, with Hanover as capital. Celle, Rosdorf, Oldenburg and the city houses are one Land system. Auskunft is Lower Saxon. There is no public inmate list, and Hamburg or Bremen will not answer a file that is still here.Open this area →land · SchwerinMecklenburg-VorpommernMecklenburg-VorpommernMecklenburg-Vorpommern is the thinly populated north-east, from Schwerin and Rostock to the Polish border and the Baltic islands. Bützow is the historic prison town. The Land's Justizvollzug is small. There is no public inmate list, and Hamburg or Berlin will not answer a file that still sits here.Open this area →land · DüsseldorfNorth Rhine-WestphaliaNordrhein-WestfalenNorth Rhine-Westphalia is Germany's most populous Land. Düsseldorf is the capital, but Cologne, the Ruhr, Aachen, Münster and Bielefeld all feed a dense JVA map. Auskunft is this Land's. There is no public inmate list, and a Rhine-Ruhr S-Bahn map is not a roster.Open this area →land · MainzRhineland-PalatinateRheinland-PfalzRhineland-Palatinate runs from Mainz and Koblenz down the wine valleys to Trier and the French border. Diez, Wittlich and Zweibrücken are the prison towns families hunt. Auskunft belongs to this Land, not to Hesse and not to Saarland. There is no public inmate list.Open this area →land · SaarbrückenSaarlandSaarlandSaarland is Germany's smallest territorial Land, pressed against France and Luxembourg, with Saarbrücken as capital. JVA Saarbrücken is the house families mean. Auskunft is Saarland's. There is no public inmate list, and a French permis de visite will not locate or admit you.Open this area →land · DresdenSaxonySachsenSaxony is Dresden, Leipzig and Chemnitz, plus the Czech border. It is not Saxony-Anhalt. Bautzen and Waldheim carry heavy history and are working Land prisons today. Auskunft is Saxon. There is no public inmate list.Open this area →land · MagdeburgSaxony-AnhaltSachsen-AnhaltSaxony-Anhalt is Magdeburg, Halle and Dessau, not Dresden and not Leipzig. Burg, east of Magdeburg, is the large modern house families underestimate. The Land answers its own Auskunft. There is no public inmate list.Open this area →land · KielSchleswig-HolsteinSchleswig-HolsteinSchleswig-Holstein is the Danish-border Land, with Kiel as capital and Lübeck, Flensburg and Neumünster as the other working towns. Hamburg is a hole in the middle of the map, not part of this Land. Auskunft is Schleswig-Holstein's. There is no public inmate list.Open this area →land · ErfurtThuringiaThüringenThuringia is the forested middle of Germany, with Erfurt as capital and Jena, Gera and Weimar as the other names on the court map. Tonna, Untermaßfeld and Goldlauter are prison towns, not castle tours. Auskunft is Thuringian. There is no public inmate list.Open this area →

Prison guides in Germany

Each page is written for that establishment — address, how families actually locate someone, and how visits work — not a copied country intro.

Berlin

Berlin · Remand and local (men)JVA Berlin-MoabitMoabit is the courthouse jail — Alt-Moabit 12a, walking distance from the Criminal Justice Centre — where Untersuchungshaft and sentenced men share a famous wall but not the same visit paperwork.Read the guide →Berlin · Closed (men)JVA Berlin-TegelTegel is the Berlin name families say when someone lands in pre-trial or sentenced custody in the capital — a huge closed men’s JVA on Seidelstraße in Reinickendorf where visits are short, prisoner-led, and never confirmed by a casual phone call to the gate.Read the guide →

Baden-Württemberg

Bruchsal · Closed (men)JVA BruchsalBruchsal’s JVA at Schlossplatz — beside the baroque palace tourists photograph — is a working closed men’s prison in Baden-Württemberg, not a museum wing, and visit booking runs through Land BW, not Stuttgart Stammheim’s high-security desk by default.Read the guide →Stuttgart · High security (men)JVA Stuttgart-StammheimStammheim is the high-security address in Baden-Württemberg — the Stuttgart prison tied to German legal history, where visit security is stricter than at a Stuttgart-area local and where families read Land BW pages, not Berlin ZASt.Read the guide →

Lower Saxony

Celle · Closed (men)JVA CelleCelle’s JVA on Hannoversche Straße is Lower Saxony’s well-known closed men’s prison — a trainer and long-term site south of Hamburg where families from Hannover and Bremen converge once locals have done their reception work.Read the guide →

Hesse

Frankfurt am Main · Local / remand (men)JVA Frankfurt am Main IFrankfurt’s JVA I on Konrad-Adenauer-Straße is the Main metropolis local — the men’s prison beside the banking skyline where Untersuchungshaft from the Oberlandesgericht circuit meets short sentences, and where Hesse’s visit desk is not Hesse’s JVA Weiterstadt by default.Read the guide →

Hamburg

Hamburg · Local / remand (men)JVA Hamburg-FuhlsbüttelSanta Fu — JVA Hamburg-Fuhlsbüttel on Böckmannweg — is the Hanseatic city’s main men’s remand and local prison, where harbour-city court vans arrive and families from Schleswig-Holstein discover Hamburg runs its own Justizvollzug, not Berlin’s.Read the guide →

North Rhine-Westphalia

Köln · Local (men)JVA KölnKöln’s JVA on Ossendorfer Straße in Ossendorf is the Rhineland local — remand and sentenced men from Cologne courts, separate from Willich’s large NRW trainer and worlds away from Berlin Moabit’s Sprechschein culture.Read the guide →Willich · Closed (men)JVA WillichWillich on Am Deich is NRW’s workhorse — a large closed men’s prison near Viersen that takes sentenced prisoners from across North Rhine-Westphalia while families in Cologne still book Köln-Ossendorf by mistake.Read the guide →

Bavaria

München · Local / remand (men)JVA München-StadelheimStadelheim is the Munich prison name even non-Germans recognise — Stadelheimer Straße in Giesing, where Bavarian courts send remand and local prisoners, and where visit desks expect you to book at least one working day before you appear at the gate.Read the guide →

Questions families actually ask

Can I phone a German prison and ask if someone is there?
Usually not for a named person. Berlin’s central desk says telephone location checks are blocked for data-protection reasons. Write (post, fax or email) and give a return postal address, because answers go out by letter.
Is JVA the same as a US county jail?
No. A Justizvollzugsanstalt holds remand and sentenced prisoners under Land law. There is no sheriff’s roster, no bond schedule, and no public charge table.
Does CurrentPrisonList list who is in jail in Germany today?
No. Germany pages are geographic and procedural guides. German prison administrations do not publish who is in custody. Telephone location checks are usually refused; written Auskunft is gated by each Land’s prison data-protection law. We do not list inmates. Always confirm Besuchszeiten with the JVA before travelling.
Why does Germany have Länder (federal states) instead of one mixed list?
Germany’s first-level map is the 16 Länder. Justizvollzug is a Land job. Bavaria will not answer a Berlin Auskunft, and NRW will not confirm a Hamburg JVA. Each Land page on this site is its own article — not a cloned ‘German state’ blurb. Mixing those units would be the same mistake as putting Ohio inmates under California.
How do I visit a prison in Germany?
Identify the establishment through Berliner Justizvollzug — Zentrale Auskunftsstelle or the lawyer, get on the visitor list, and book that house. The prisoner typically applies. Slots are short — Tegel around forty minutes, a few times a month. Moabit closes social visits on Fridays and weekends. Carry a passport or national ID; a driving licence often fails. Always re-read that JVA’s Besucher page. Plan travel via Berlin only if the letter actually names a house there — the Land pages exist because it often does not.

Other countries

Each country is a separate area of the site so US county rosters, UK prisons and European JVA / maison d’arrêt guides never share a URL.

GBUnited Kingdom13 Nations and regions · 140 prison guidesFRFranceFrance13 Régions · 8 prison guidesDKDenmarkDanmark5 Regions · 3 prison guidesIEIrelandÉire26 Counties · 4 prison guidesNLNetherlandsNederland12 Provinces · 3 prison guidesBEBelgiumBelgië / Belgique13 Regions and provinces · 3 prison guidesESSpainEspaña17 Autonomous communities · 3 prison guidesITItalyItalia20 Regioni · 4 prison guides

All countries →

Source

Confirm location, visits and hours on the official service. This site does not list who is in custody.

Official locatorBerliner Justizvollzug — Zentrale AuskunftsstelleOpen official site →