The SA Police Service has rejected a Democratic Alliance call to remove Director Attie Trollip from criminal investigations.

Acting national police commissioner Director Sally de Beer on Thursday said DA politician and former Western Cape police commissioner Lennit Max in a speech on Tuesday had lambasted the police for not appointing a female officer to "interrogate" rape victim Rene Burger.

Dismissing Max's statement as factually incorrect she said Burger had made a statement to a female superintendent attached to the Elsies River family, child protection and sexual offences unit.

Trollip obtained an additional statement and conducted follow-up interviews with Burger in the presence of at least one of her parents, she said.

The 20-year-old Burger was grabbed in a parking lot at the Tygerberg campus of the University of the Western Cape on 5 May by three armed men, and raped and beaten.

She had agreed to the release of her name, family spokesperson Elna Boesak told Sapa in May, saying: "You stop being a victim when you choose not to allow something like this to destroy your dignity and self worth."

On Wednesday Die Burger newspaper reported that Max in his speech accused Trollip of using unsympathetic and unconventional investigative methods.

Accusations of incompetence

The newspaper reported that the Burger family had criticised police handling of the case, complaining of "antagonistic" interrogation in the absence of a female police officer.

Max said the irregularities surrounding investigations did not surprise the DA because Trollip had previously been accused of unconventional investigation methods, the paper reported.

De Beer said Max's media statement on Tuesday referred to the "incompetence of the investigation officer".

This was "grossly insulting and unfair", she said.

An advocate of the Western Cape directorate of public prosecutions had told the police the investigating officer had been "very careful", De Beer said.

"The Saps makes a call upon all parties to let this investigation run its course and not to cast wild aspersions on the integrity of a senior police official — or any other person — for the purposes of sensationalism or politicking.

"Director Trollip will not be removed from this case or from any other criminal investigation," De Beer said.

Sapa