Correction Appended
County attorney candidate Gerald Richard decided he wanted to run for office in fifth grade.
He jumped into the race for fifth-grade class president but was delivered an early dose of politics when a girl in his class stood up and said, "Gerald Richard, I wouldn't vote for you if you ran for president against Frankenstein!"
"It's a fifth-grade kind of thing," Richard said. "That's how girls say they like you."
Although the grade-school incident made Richard start thinking about running for office, his aspirations don't reach quite as far as the White House these days.
"I just want to be county attorney," he said.
Now, the Democrat and ASU alumnus is the only candidate who has officially announced he will run for county attorney in 2008.
Richard has been collecting signatures to make the ballot at ASU's Tempe campus in the past few weeks.
Republican Andrew Thomas currently holds the county attorney office but has not yet announced if he will seek re-election.
Thomas, a graduate of Harvard Law School, has launched an exploratory committee and insiders say he will likely be on the ballot in November.
"It's a good bet that he's going to run," said Barnett Lotstein, a special assistant to County Attorney Thomas.
He will not announce his candidacy until after the nomination petition signature filing deadline on June 4, Lotstein said.
Richard came to ASU on a track scholarship in 1973, and ran the 440-meter intermediate hurdles.
He majored in insurance through the business college, and graduated from ASU's law school in 1985. Richard spent two semesters as an adjunct faculty member, teaching insurance and business law on campus.
With two years of law enforcement experience in the Valley, Richard said he plans to resolve the more than 40,000 outstanding felony warrants in Maricopa County.
"I want to prosecute those individuals," he said. "I want to bring them to justice."
Richard also hopes to increase safety at ASU specifically by decreasing sexual assaults and burglaries from cars and houses, as well working on as drug issues.
As he lounged at a Starbucks table inside the Memorial Union, Richard gestured around him, saying that he wants to recruit from Arizona schools to fill law enforcement positions.
"I'm coming back to where I started," he said. "Think about it: Years ago, I used to sit at tables at ASU just like this, talking to my girlfriend who is now my wife of 24 years."
Richard met his wife, Curtia, on her first day at ASU as she was moving into the Manzanita residence hall.
They now have two daughters, who Richard said are handling the rigors of their father's campaign well. He coaches his 19-year-old daughter, Andrea's, club track team, the Arizona Flames.
"[We're] trying to make some future ASU track stars," he said.
Richard said he hopes to make the ASU community proud in his campaign.
"ASU can say, 'Look at what he's been able to do. He's one of us,'" Richard said. "I will make them proud as to say, 'We have a Sun Devil as the county attorney.'"
Correction: April 29, 2008
The article incorrectly reported Gerald Richard as having two years of law enforcement experience. He has 22 years of law enforcement experience.
Reach the reporter at: leigh.munsil@asu.edu.
