Ugulava was appointed Mayor of Tbilisi on July 12, 2005. When this post became elective in 2006, he ran successfully for mayor, and was elected by the Tbilisi Assembly on October 12, 2006 and re-elected through a direct vote on May 30, 2010. After the UNM-dominated central government was defeated by the Georgian Dream coalition in the 2012 parliamentary election, Ugulava was suspended on 22 December 2013 from his functions by a court for alleged misuse of funds. He was arrested on July 3, 2014 on charges of money misspending and laundering in the funding of his party's campaign in June municipal elections. His supporters accused the government of politically motivated persecution of Ugulava. On 18 September 2015 a court sentenced him to 4.5 years in jail.