'Unprovoked' homeless camp attack: Woman arrested
Megan Strahl is being held at Santa Rita Jail on $70,000 bail.
A woman was arrested Saturday morning at Berkeley's largest homeless camp after smashing a mug over a man's head and chasing him with a sledgehammer, police report.
A second unrelated attack happened Sunday night in the same area, according to records reviewed by The Berkeley Scanner.
On Saturday morning, a man in his 40s flagged down the Berkeley Fire Department for help with a head wound he'd just sustained in the Harrison Street homeless encampment near Eighth Street, police said.
He told authorities a woman had broken a ceramic coffee cup over his head, which shattered and cut him, Berkeley police said.
She then hit him with a barbecue grill and chased him while wielding a sledgehammer, he said.
The victim and other witnesses — all encampment residents — described the attack as unprovoked, police said.
Megan Strahl. BPD
Police arrested the suspect, 35-year-old Megan Strahl, at the end of Eighth Street near the Albany border and confiscated the sledgehammer, BPD said.
Strahl, who also lives in the encampment, has a 2022 conviction for felony arson and has been on probation since July 2026 for vandalism, according to court papers and police.
Strahl also has a stay-away order from Blue Willow Teaspot on 10th Street following a separate vandalism report last year.
She is now in custody, held on $70,000 bail, at Santa Rita Jail in Dublin.
Strahl is scheduled for arraignment Wednesday.
Saturday morning's attack was one of two reported at the encampment over the weekend.
On Sunday night, a local hospital called to report that a man had come in for treatment after being struck by someone with a crowbar at Eighth and Harrison streets.
The man, who had been hit in the head and on his body, left before police arrived.
Officers determined that he was not the same man injured Saturday morning but had no other information about the incident.
The Harrison encampment has also seen numerous fires this year, with 26 calls to the Berkeley Fire Department including about a dozen involving tents that burned.
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