David Heilpern is an Australian lawyer and author. After attending school in Sydney, and university in Sydney, Canberra and Lismore, New South Wales, Heilpern became a solicitor and barrister. He is the author of For Fear of Favour: Sexual Assault of Young Prisoners, a prominent study of sexual assault in prisons, and has been an advocate of prison and law reform. In 1998 he became one of the youngest Magistrates in New South Wales. In 2004 he was awarded Southern Cross University's Alumnus of the Decade Award.