Rounding Up Suspects, Pakistan Charges a Baby

Musa Khan, 9 months old, was fingerprinted last Thursday, charged with attempted murder in a stoning attack. Credit Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

By DECLAN WALSH, NYT, APRIL 8, 2014

LONDON — Pakistan’s troubled criminal judicial system has failed to prosecute several notorious figures living there over the years, including Hafiz Saeed, the militant leader with a $10 million American reward on his head, and Osama Bin Laden.

But Pakistani justice has not been hesitant with Musa Khan, a 9-month-old boy who faces charges of attempted murder and whose relatives have spirited him into hiding.

In a case that has heaped ridicule on the under-resourced police force, the baby boy was charged alongside four adults in connection with a violent protest in a Lahore slum in February. Slum residents threw stones at gas company workers who had tried to disconnect households that failed to pay their bills, leading the police to charge an entire family with attempted murder, including baby Musa.

The absurdity of the case became apparent last Thursday when the screaming child was produced in court, and had to be comforted with a milk bottle as a court official recorded his thumbprint.

(More here.)