KARACHI: A judicial magistrate has handed over the custody of a teenage suspect to police for an ossification test to determine whether he is a juvenile or not in a case pertaining to the alleged rape of an American woman in her Defence Housing Authority (DHA) apartment.

The investigating officer of the case produced the suspect before Judicial Magistrate Muzammil Ali Soomro and sought his physical custody for interrogation.

However, after hearing the IO and examining the photocopies of the birth certificate of the suspect, which allegedly showed him as a juvenile person, the court handed over the suspect to police for four days to determine his actual age.

In his order, the court observed that the suspect’s physical appearance indicated that he appeared to be an adult and that his apparent age did not, prima facie, correspond with the age mentioned in the photocopy of the birth certificate submitted before the court.

“In these circumstances, the claim of juvenility requires verification before the benefit of the Juvenile Justice System Act can be extended,” it added.

“In the interest of justice and for the proper determination of age, it is necessary that his ossification test be conducted without delay,” the order stated.

The court directed the IO to have the ossification test conducted by a competent medical board.

According to the complainant, she is a permanent resident of the US and had been living in DHA since April. She alleged that at around 4am on July 17, the suspect sexually assaulted her in her home and fled.

Published in Dawn, July 21st, 2026