Jonathan Nicola and Kelly Cutting

American visa: However, the fiction unravelled after he applied in December for an American visa so he could travel to the States to play basketball with his high school team, government lawyer Kelly Cutting told the April 19 detention review, according to Huffington Post Canada. Information from U.S. authorities showed Nicola had applied unsuccessfully for refugee status in 2007 and had given his date of birth as Nov. 1, 1986, which would now make him 29 years old, not 17. For the time being, however, Jonathan Nicola will remain behind bars after an immigration official ruled that he cannot be trusted. "I am not a liar person,'' Nicola recently told an Immigration and Refugee Board hearing via video conference. "I did not come here to harm any people or do something bad.'' Nicola arrived in Canada on Nov. 23, 2015, and was issued a study permit to attend Catholic Central Secondary School in Windsor, Ont., which had offered him an athletic scholarship, according to board documents. "I did not come here to harm any people or do something bad.'' Both his passport and study-permit application state his date of birth as Nov. 25, 1998, meaning he would be 17 years old. A South Sudanese student accused of passing himself off as a teenager will likely face a hearing on whether he should be kicked out of Canada, immigration officials said Wednesday. After an interview at the Toronto consulate in January, U.S. authorities turned him down on the grounds he had lied about his age and that he was, in fact, trying to immigrate to the U.S. rather than visit. He had also applied for a U.S. student visa in April 2015, where he hoped to go to become a student on a full scholarship and gave his date of birth as 1998, Cutting said. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.