Metropolitan Police Department (DC Police / MPD)

‘Quelling the Violence in the City': DC Names Interim Police Chief

Ashan Benedict will become the interim chief of the Metropolitan Police Department, Mayor Muriel Bowser announced

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D.C.’s mayor announced an interim police chief who will serve once the current chief retires soon.

Ashan Benedict will become the interim chief of the Metropolitan Police Department, Mayor Muriel Bowser announced Friday morning. Benedict currently serves as the executive assistant chief of police.

“I know that he is going to do a fine job in making sure that we’re deploying our men and women, keeping the District safe,” Bowser said at a news conference.

Benedict joined MPD in 2021 and previously served at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

He said Friday that he will not seek to become the department’s permanent chief, calling it a personal decision.

“I think I’m better suited to support the department as the executive assistant chief and now as the interim chief while the search continues,” he said.

“My focus is on the city and quelling the violence in the city,” Benedict continued.

He takes over Wednesday. MPD’s current chief, Robert Contee, will retire on June 3 and become an assistant director of the FBI.

The leadership change comes amid an increase in violent crime in the District, including one shooting that killed a 10-year-old girl riding in a car with her family and another that killed a 17-year-old boy outside his school.

D.C. officials will search nationwide for a new, permanent police chief. Bowser said she’s looking for “a leader and a crime fighter” with a “laser focus on driving down crime.”

“While you don’t have to be from Washington, D.C., you better know it darn well,” she said.

Bowser did not give a timeline for when she hopes to be able to name a permanent police chief. Once she selects someone, her pick will face confirmation by the D.C. Council.

Benedict was the incident commander for ATF’s deployment at the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021 attack, his bio says. He responded to and investigated the 2001 terror attack on the Pentagon, the Beltway Sniper killings, the Navy Yard mass shooting and other major crises, according to his bio. He is a D.C. resident and father of three.

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