Detroit Mayor David Bing has fired the city's police chief, James Barren, who had been on the job less than a year, the Detroit Free Press reports.
Before being elected mayor, Bing had said he would retain Barren, saying Barren shares his vision of making public safety a top priority. The new chief is expected to be Warren Evans, the Wayne County sheriff and one of 14 candidates who ran against Bing in the spring election.
The Police Department also sustained a public relations blow on Thursday when it acknowledged that there had been 375 homicides in the city in 2008, 36 more than it had reported to the F.B.I. after the Detroit News reported that the police had been undercounting them, according to a New York Times report.
