Jiah Khan's suicide staged: British expert

'Indian forensic experts didn't study medical evidence in the case thoroughly.'

In a new twist to the three-year-old Jiah Khan case, a British forensic expert has claimed that the Ghajini star's suicide was staged, Times of India reports.



Jason James, the expert hired by Jiah's mother, has revealed that the new reports contradict those by Indian experts. Jiah's mother Rabia Khan intends to present them before a city session court on Wednesday.

The development comes a month after the court ruled out foul play in the case. Jiah was dating Aditya Pancholi's son Sooraj Pancholi. The Bollywood starlet was found hanging in her apartment on June 3, 2013.

PHOTO: WORDPRESS

Maharashtra forensic experts had said that the injury marks on Jiah's lower lip were probably the result of "friction with the teeth during the commission of the act [suicide]". But James has said the injuries "represent either abrasions or bruises", and are indicative of "blunt force trauma to the mouth region (for example punching or a hand placed over the mouth)", Times of India reports.



"I would have expected any forensic specialist to have insisted on seeing the dupatta. I do not see any realistic possibility of the dupatta creating the patterned injury under the chin. Other causes or objects should have been considered such as a blunt impact from a patterned object, or a ligature made of different material," James's report reads.

He questioned how Indian investigators failed to explore theories other than suicide. "I do not believe that the possibility of a staged hanging after death that has been caused previously has been properly considered (e.g. ligature strangulation with some other material and then Nafisa Khan (Jiah) being hung with the dupatta)," he said. "The marks on the left arm and the lower lip are consistent with assaultive injuries... the marks of ligature and the mark on the chin are not consistent with simple hanging with the dupatta," he added.

James believes Indian forensic experts didn't study medical evidence thoroughly. "There are a number of serious misinterpretations (or exclusions of reasonable inferences) of the medical evidence, and that the apparent intention to attribute her death to suicide may mean that the real possibility of a staged hanging subsequent to earlier death at the hands of another has been missed," the report reads.

Aditya Pancholi expressed his reservations over the new report saying, "This report is from a private forensic lab and it's paid. We will see if a court admits it or not. The investigations have been done by different agencies and all of them have come to the same conclusion [that it was a suicide]."

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