Update

GEORGE NEWS - The defence representative for Johan ‘Jakes’ Jacobs, one of the alleged killers of the controversial Cape Town businessman Mark Lifman (56), argued in the George Regional Court this morning, Wednesday 28 January, that the State’s hands in the matter are not clean.

According to Adv Michael Hellens SC, the State misled the court during previous appearances by claiming that the matter had been finalised and that it was ready to proceed to trial. 

Hellens argued that the State deliberately played for time to prevent the case from being struck off the court roll. This allegedly misleading conduct by the police and the State, he said, resulted in delays in securing a trial date.

Hellens said the bail application, the second to be brought, is based on new facts obtained after Jacobs and his co-accused, Gert Bezuidenhout, had been denied bail for the first time in the George Magistrate’s Court in January 2025.

The police arrested the two on 3 November 2024, a few hours after Lifman had been shot dead in the Garden Route Mall’s parking area.

Read more on sister publication, George Herald

‘We bring you the latest Garden Route, Hessequa, Karoo news’