NYPD Dedicates CompStat Room To Creator Jack Maple

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) -- New York City Police Commissioner Bill Bratton has dedicated the room where police brass are grilled over rising crime to the architect of the department's crime tracking system.

Jack Maple created CompStat in the 1990s.

The data-driven system of tracking crimes allows police to better allocate resources to high-crime areas.

Maple came up with the idea by collecting crime statistics, writing the numbers on napkins and spreading them out on bar tables.

Crime started falling and has been on a downward spiral ever since.

"Next year we will celebrate 25 straight years of crime decline in the city," Bratton said.

Bratton said Maple helped make the city what it is today -- safe.

"The 'Jack Maple CompStat Center,' I've waited 20 years to say that," Bratton said. "One of the major reasons I wanted to come back was to make sure that the legacy of this great man was ensured."

"What Jack Maple brought to American policing was effectively a redesign, a rearchitecturing of how we think about crime," Deputy Commissioner John Miller said.

The portly Queens native was rarely seen in public without a bow tie, Homburg hat and two-toned shoes.

He died from cancer in 2001 at age 48.

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