The Independent Complaints Directorate (ICD) is investigating charges of defeating the ends of justice after claims of a cover-up in the Robert McBride car-crash investigation, South African Broadcasting Corporation news reported on Sunday.
It quoted an ICD spokesperson as saying that no blood sample had been taken as required by law.
Witnesses said McBride appeared to be drunk, and that they were intimidated and assaulted. The ICD was therefore also probing charges of intimidation and assault.
McBride was involved in a road accident on the R511 near Centurion on December 21 after leaving a year-end function to attend to an incident report.
At the time, Ekurhuleni metro police denied that McBride was drunk or that metro police officers assaulted or threatened witnesses.
Earlier this week, it was reported that McBride would be investigated for reckless driving and not drunken driving, despite witness reports that he was ”blind drunk”.
According to Gauteng police spokesperson Director Govindsamy Mariemuthoo, no evidence of drunken driving was received from the metro police and therefore McBride could not be charged for drunken driving.
”I cannot tell if any blood tests were taken. I can’t talk for the metro police and they were the ones that were at the scene,” he told the Mail & Guardian Online on Thursday. At that stage, the South African Police Service was not involved in the matter.
Earlier media reports had quoted witnesses as saying McBride was ”blind drunk” at the time of the accident and that metro police handling the matter had assaulted and threatened people.
”If there was evidence, he would be investigated for drunk driving but the only charges against him are for reckless or negligent driving,” said Mariemuthoo.
”We are still busy with the investigation and once the investigation is finalised we will place it with the director of public prosecutions,” Mariemuthoo told the South African Press Association on Thursday.
He said there was no timetable for completing the investigation and would not confirm media reports on Thursday that the docket had been sent to provincial police Commissioner Perumal Naidoo. — Sapa