This article is 7 years old

Mayoral Candidate Running Wolf Released From Jail

Berkeley mayoral candidate Zachary Running Wolf was arrested for vandalism and marijuana possession on September 12. He ran his campaign from jail until his release on October 12.

News

Berkeley mayoral candidate Zachary Running Wolf was arrested for vandalism and marijuana possession on September 12. He ran his campaign from jail until his release on October 12.

Running Wolf was participating in a prison protest to raise awareness surrounding the discrimination that convicts face within prison. Running Wolf’s campaign manager  Thomas Hodgman said, “Zachary RunningWolf is being charged with spray-painting the side of a Bank of America building when he was allegedly surveilled by an Oakland Police officer while participating in a march in solidarity with the largest national prison strike to end prison slavery in US history.”

While Hodgeman does not acknowledge Running Wolf’s alleged vandalism, he does provide justifications for his supposed actions. “Throughout the country, slavery in the United States is legal under the thirteenth amendment, and hundreds of thousands of prisoners are forced to work for nineteen to forty cents an hour,” stated Hodgeman. “Many of these prisoners — disproportionately people of color — are incarcerated for nonviolent charges, like the ones brought against Running Wolf, such as possessing small amounts of marijuana or spray-painting the side of the building of a mega corporation like the Bank of America.”

He ran for mayor in 2012 and lost. He was arrested in 2012 for vandalism, charged with putting campaign stickers on a trash can. Running Wolf’s campaign is focused on issues of police reform by lowering racial profiling in Berkeley, UC corruption, community, and lowering emissions generated by Berkeley.

Some believe that Running Wolf’s activism isn’t beneficial to his role as mayor. Allison Burnstein, a Berkeley resident, stated, “Running a city requires pragmatic leadership. What the city government needs to do is take care of the business of running a city. I support the ending of private prisons, but I don’t see what it has to do with running for mayor. We need a candidate who both shares both our ideals and has shown themselves the willing and able to tackle the problems facing our city.”

This is not the first time a Berkeley mayoral candidate has been arrested. In 2002, mayor Tom Bates was convicted and plead guilty of stealing one thousand copies of The Daily Californian, a newspaper that had endorsed his then-opponent Shirley Dean. Running Wolf was in county jail for nearly a month, and continued to protest from inside.

He began a hunger-strike in hopes of lowering his fifty thousand-dollar bail and bringing his sentence hearing closer, which had been delayed twice.

Hodgman says, “He’s in excellent health, taking in fluids, and sharing his food with the other prisoners.” Running Wolf had been released as of October 12.