Mark Lifman murdered — the life and alleged crimes of the controversial Cape businessman

He was accused of crimes including murder. And now he has been murdered.

Sources have confirmed that controversial Cape Town businessman Mark Lifman was fatally shot outside the Garden Route Mall in the Western Cape town of George on Sunday.

He was walking alone when he was targeted.

An image of the scene shows a body covered in a light material, some of it silver, lying on tar between cars in a parking lot.

‘Assailants fled’

On Sunday afternoon, Western Cape police issued a statement about the murder, but did not name Lifman as the victim.

Colonel Andrè Traut confirmed a shooting happened outside the mall at about 11.30am.

“A 57-year-old man was killed by unknown assailants who fled the scene,” he said.

“The circumstances of the incident are now the subject of a police investigation, and more information cannot be disclosed at this stage.”

Daily Maverick understands Lifman turned 57 this year, so his age matches that of the man killed. Reports of arrests in connection with his murder surfaced later on Sunday, but police were yet to confirm this officially.

Over decades, Lifman’s name, despite his denials, has become cemented in accusations of organised crime.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGZNDHXBOxE

He dabbled in the fashion industry, the property market, horse racing and private security — with accusations against him surfacing especially in relation to the latter two.

‘Steroid King’

Lifman was murdered on Sunday while on trial — and out on bail — for a murder.

He was expected back in the dock in the Western Cape High Court this week with several others for that trial, which is focused on the August 2017 murder of international steroid smuggler Brian Wainstein, who had been wanted in the US.

Wainstein, known as the Steroid King, was shot dead in his bed in his home in the upmarket Cape Town suburb of Constantia.

Read more: Charges against murdered ‘Steroid King’ reveal a global web of crime cases

Lifman was not the first accused in this case to be murdered.

When Lifman was arrested for the Wainstein murder in December 2020, he was detained along with Jerome “Donkie” Booysen and William “Red” Stevens.

Stevens was reputed to have been one of the most seasoned 27s gangsters in the Western Cape.

Read more: Underworld suspect shot dead – one week before scheduled court appearance in Cape Town for murder

He was shot dead in early 2021, about a week before he was due back in court with Lifman and Booysen in connection with Wainstein’s murder.

Nightclub security backdrop

Lifman was involved in private security in Cape Town — an arena marked by murders and extortion accusations.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGJQ2DYAgjw

In the 1990s, Cyril Beeka, a rumoured apartheid state operative, ran a security outfit in Cape Town, which some police officers maintained was an extortion racket linked to the Italian Mafia.

Police investigators said Beeka used mobs of men to force his “security” services on establishments.

Beeka was murdered in 2011.

After Beeka’s murder, Lifman, Booysen and another associate of theirs, Andre Naude (also an accused in the Wainstein murder case), became prominent in private security focused on Cape Town’s city centre but also extending further afield.

Read more: Two Cape Town shootings, one outside an upmarket restaurant, echo private security skirmishes of years past

Lifman and Naude were arrested and faced 313 charges for allegedly running a security company without the necessary registration.

In 2015 they were cleared of those charges and countered that the State had targeted them.

In 2017, suspected organised crime kingpin Nafiz Modack, who had known Beeka and seemed to be aligned with him, allegedly tried to seize control of bouncer operations in the city from the “Lifman group”.

According to police investigators and what surfaced in court cases, clashes between the “Modack group” and the “Lifman group” sparked violence in Cape Town from 2017 onwards.

Modack was arrested and then acquitted for security service-related matters. He was subsequently rearrested for other crimes and is now in custody and on trial for the murder of policeman Charl Kinnear in Cape Town in September 2020.

Read more: Multiple dry runs leading up to hit on anti-gang cop Charl Kinnear, court hears

Kinnear was one of the police officers investigating organised crime in Cape Town, including nightclub security skirmishes.

At a court case in Cape Town, Kinnear testified that he had met Lifman three times — twice at his house — and that the visits related to a criminal case.

Accusations, acquittal and denials

This journalist’s book The Enforcers – Inside Cape Town’s Deadly Nightclub Battles provides in-depth detail on how elements of private security allegedly became involved in criminal activities and controlled bouncer operations in the city.

A section about Lifman says: “[He] has consistently denied being involved in crime; nonetheless, his name consistently comes up in discussions about underworld dealings, and legal action has repeatedly been instituted against him.

“In 2001 the Jockey Club of South Africa banned him for life from any role in horseracing over claims involving two incidents in which jockeys were intimidated.

“And in 2005 he was charged with indecently assaulting seven boys, plus the attempted murder of a man who had allegedly procured the boys; he was acquitted in 2009 due to ‘contradictory and poor evidence’ and when a state witness suddenly recanted.”

Taxman and the ‘rogues’ ruse

Lifman also had problems with the South African Revenue Service (SARS).

About a decade ago, SARS investigated his tax affairs and he was hit with a R388-million tax bill.

As detailed in The Enforcers, Lifman had countered that the investigation was based on intelligence gathered by what became known, via reports in the Sunday Times, as the SARS “rogue unit”.

However, the “rogue unit” narrative turned out to be untrue and SARS  issued a statement saying it was based on “false allegations”.

SARS was one of the casualties of State Capture and the “rogue unit” was viewed as a product, or idea, that captors peddled.

In February 2022, it became apparent that Lifman was still embroiled in tax issues with SARS after City Press reported: “Lifman wants the Cape Town High Court to prevent the tax collector from liquidating his property business.”

Damages claims

At the time of his murder, Lifman was taking legal action against, among others, Randolf Jorberg, the owner of the Beerhouse in Cape Town’s city centre.

Lifman was claiming damages of R1-million.

The Beerhouse saga goes back many years.

Daily Maverick has reported that a doorman, Joe Kanyona, was murdered at the Beerhouse in 2015, allegedly after Jorberg refused to sign up with a group offering “services” styled as security.

Read more: Police and business turn the screws on extortion mafia terrorising all corners of SA

At the end of July 2024, the Beerhouse announced it was shutting because of matters relating to extortion.

The investigative TV programme Carte Blanche ran a segment on Beerhouse and in an interview Jorberg referenced Lifman.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j2MFtwk-ZPA

In an affidavit dated 21 October, Lifman asserted that Jorberg had defamed him through statements he made on Carte Blanche and social media posts.

“The aforesaid statements are, to the knowledge of the defendant, false, vexatious and malicious,” states the affidavit.

“I have not been convicted by any court of any of the crimes which the defendant associates me with in his publications.

“I have been severely prejudiced by the publications. Because of the defamation and in particular the extremely serious nature thereof, I have been damaged in my reputation and have suffered damages in the sum of R1,000,000.00.”

On 25 October, Lifman’s lawyers served this journalist a letter of demand.

Lifman wanted certain parts of The Enforcers retracted and an apology.

One of the sections Lifman wanted retracted were comments contained in a statement by a police officer, Lieutenant Colonel Peter Janse Viljoen.

The statement had been read out during court proceedings in a previous matter against Lifman’s alleged rival Modack in February 2018.

Janse Viljoen alleged that the “Lifman group” had been in control of bouncer activities for “a very long time. They are known to use strong-arm tactics to take control of the bouncer industry by intimidating and threatening club owners with threats of violence and have at times resorted to violence if the owners rejected their services.”

Lifman would have had a chance to officially share his version of events had he testified in the Wainstein murder trial.

But now the very crime he was accused of — murder — has claimed his life. DM

This Thursday in Cape Town, journalist Caryn Dolley (author of this article) will be speaking alongside former Anti-Gang Unit boss Major General André Lincoln at the in-person book launch for "Man Alone: Mandela's top cop - exposing South Africa's ceaseless sabotage". The event, hosted by Rebecca Davis, will take place at Workshop 17 Watershed, V&A Waterfront. Tickets are R120 and R60 for Maverick Insiders. Book your seat here and join this behind-the-scenes discussion.