Career
He served as Attorney General of Germany from June 1990 until July 1993. Before he was appointed Attorney General, he served as an Under-Secretary of State in the Berlin State Ministry of Justice (1975–1989), in West Berlin. His term as Attorney General was marked by the war on terror (particularly the Red Army Faction) and the prosecution of former communist criminals after the downfall of the German Democratic Republic communist regime.
In 1991, he indicted Erich Mielke, who was subsequently convicted of murder.
On 6 July 1993, he was removed from his post by Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger following a row over the alleged police shooting of a suspected terrorist, Wolfgang Grams, on 27 June. The Minister of the Interior, Rudolf Seiters, had resigned two days before.
An investigation did not reveal any wrongdoing on the part of the police or the authorities, and there were calls by some to reinstate Stahl in his position. He has subsequently worked as a lawyer
He was Secretary General of the Freie Demokratische Partei (Free Democratic Party) parliamentary group in the Berlin state parliament from 1970 to 1975.
In the 1990s, he and other liberals tried to revive the national liberal tradition of the Freie Demokratische Partei (Free Democratic Party). He was a candidate for President of the Berlin state party in 1996 and 1998, but lost narrowly to the candidate of the left-wing, Martin Matz, who later defected to the Social Democratic Party of Germany, retaining his parliamentary mandate. He is a prominent supporter of, contributor to, and lawyer for the liberal-conservative newspaper Junge Freiheit.