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Fraudsters, fakes, and a flair for the dramatic – Frederik Enslin and Stephanie Olivier, the Bonnie and Clyde of bogus law, were finally cuffed by the Hawks in the Western Cape last week.
The duo stand accused of running the ultimate legal pantomime, slapping together a phony law firm and allegedly scamming a Canadian mining outfit out of millions of rands. And that’s just the highlight reel.
They were in the Olifantshoek Magistrate’s Court last Thursday for their debut appearance. Bail’s been kicked down the road to 22 April, The Citizen reported.
Now, while the fraud and money-laundering rap sheet only officially landed in 2022, the Enslin saga has been bubbling away for nearly a decade, proof that the best scams age like bad wine.
And Olivier? She’s moonlighting on a side plot of her own – separate fraud, theft, and money laundering charges in a case orbiting none other than fugitive pulpit hustler Shepherd Bushiri. The company you keep, right?
Daily Maverick previously reported that it was understood she had been the accountant of Willah Mudolo, who is a co-accused in a case against self-styled “prophet” Shepherd Bushiri.
Her 2022 arrest was connected to a case involving fraud, theft and money laundering allegations linked to the Mudolo-Bushiri matter. That case is still unfolding, with Bushiri fighting his extradition from Malawi to South Africa so that he can stand trial.
Their greatest hit was allegedly launching Enslin Olivier Inc. – a law firm so fake it deserves its own Netflix series. Clients were apparently billed for services neither of them were remotely qualified to offer, but hey, fake it till you make it.
Flashback to around 2015, when Enslin swapped suits for shovels and played pretend coal baron. The target was a Canadian company seduced by the promise of a truckload of black gold.
Forensic investigator Chad Thomas of IRS Forensic Investigations laid it bare: “There was never any coal, never any deal. It was just Enslin who hoodwinked the company into believing that a large amount of coal was available at a bargain price.”
The Canadians took the scenic route through the courts, and the Pretoria High Court eventually handed them a juicy $ 979,000 payout – nearly R19 million in today’s battered rands.
But Enslin wasn’t about to stick around for the encore. He pulled a Houdini, only to pop up in the sleepy surf town of Langebaan, slinging pipes under the name Kakaboy Plumbing. Nothing says “fresh start” like a loo-themed rebrand.
“Then he reinvented himself as a security professional. Down came the Kakaboy Plumbing signs and up went the security company boards, right next to the police station,” Thomas deadpanned.
And if you thought that was the end of the identity bingo, think again.
“It is beyond comprehension that folk in a small town like Langebaan did not find it strange how, in just a few short years, a plumber reinvented himself as a security expert claiming to be an ex-Recce, and then again as one of the world’s foremost legal minds. It actually beggars belief,” Thomas said.
Turns out the final act of his chameleon career was moonlighting as a world-class legal eagle, which became his undoing.
Enslin didn’t just play dress-up; he allegedly claimed a library’s worth of fake law degrees while swapping his security company logos for his shiny new ‘law firm’ brand.
Thomas added that Enslin presented himself as “one of the world’s finest litigators,” with a résumé that would make even Harvard blush; “doctorates and other qualifications that did not exist.”
The pièce de résistance was when the world went into lockdown, Enslin apparently turned his office into a fake courtroom, complete with a robe, webcam, and all, arguing imaginary cases for very real, and very duped, clients.
Thomas, who’d had a front-row seat to the charade, filed a case at Langebaan Saps, which then moved up the food chain to the Western Cape Provincial Commercial Crime Unit.
Word of the scam spread. An advocate in Limpopo flagged the operation, and an attorney in Kathu followed suit, opening another fraud case.
But Enslin and Olivier aren’t the only ones in the fraudster’s hall of fame.
Thomas is currently untangling another tall tale involving Dean Visagie – a man who apparently never met a qualification he couldn’t Photoshop.
Visagie strutted around under the banner of Terra Firma Reverse Technologies, claiming eight degrees, two doctorates, and a stint in SA’s Special Forces. Spoiler alert: not a word of it was true.
Investors, seduced by his spiel about extracting precious metals from electronic waste, were convinced to cough up millions. Some even quit their jobs, lured by Visagie’s promises of cushy international gigs – jobs that, like his credentials, never existed.
Despite spinning a feel-good yarn about green tech and get-rich-quick rewards, the only thing Visagie recycled was hope.
A fraud and money laundering conviction in 2016 should’ve been a career-ending plot twist, but Visagie brushed it off as a “misunderstanding.” When the walls closed in, he tried the charm offensive, penning an email dripping with sincerity:
“I am reaching out to you personally, without involving any legal representation, because I believe in transparency and the importance of truth.”
And the Oscar-worthy line that followed:
“I would greatly appreciate the opportunity to meet you to share my perspective. While I have experienced threats from other media sources, these situations did not lead anywhere.
“I am convinced that the truth deserves to be heard and understood in its entirety.”
A fresh criminal case is now locked and loaded against him, with Thomas warning the full scale of damage to victims’ bank accounts might be impossible to tally.
As for Visagie, even he finally admitted the truth: all his so-called qualifications were pure fiction. The only real skill these fraudsters seem to have is spinning a world-class yarn.
[Sources: Daily Maverick & The Citizen]
