A 9-month-old Pakistani boy accused of attempted murder is reportedly being sent into hiding because of the furor surrounding the case.

Musa Khan can barely fit his hands around a milk bottle, but he was charged with attempted murder in Lahore, Pakistan after members of his family allegedly attacked gas company employees who threatened to disconnect the gas flow to homes of customers who had not paid their bills. Khan's whole family was accused of attempted murder in February, which is how Khan got slapped with the charge. 

The boy's grandfather, Muhammad Yasin, said on Tuesday that he is forced to send the baby to Faisalabad, roughly 116 miles away.

The case has turned Pakistani police into something of an international laughingstock. It has also spotlighted a legal system that can quickly charge a baby with a serious crime but has struggled to bring Taliban militants and other criminals to trial.

Reports of human rights infractions and amateurism within the Pakistani police are common, according to reports. Human Rights Watch says police forces are incapable of defending against attacks from militants, yet some militants have seemingly vanished in their custody. The police have also been accused of "extrajudicial killings" and torturing suspected criminals.

Muhammad Yasin held the boy as he was thumb-printed by officials on April 3, after which he sucked on a milk bottle. While many children of his age are still learning how to crawl, Khan has been accused of attempted murder.

Khan is scheduled to make his next court appearance on April 12, though it remains unclear whether that will happen, both because he is in hiding and because the attempted murder charge is likely to be dropped soon, according to Reuters.

Rana Sanaullah Khan, the law minister overseeing the case, has ordered an investigation into how a 9-month-old could be charged with such a crime, and one police officer has been suspended. (Although he bears the same last name as Musa Khan, the two appear to be unrelated. "Khan" is not an uncommon name in Pakistan.)

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