Doctors who treated her on the legend of Maradona football before her death leave for the trial for homicide

BUENOS AIRES – Seven members of the medical team who treated the Argentine football the great Diego Maradona before his death, will be tried for homicides starting on Tuesday in Buenos Aires.

The case revolves around the statements that negligence by health professionals contributed to the winner of the World Cup Death in 2020 at 60, who triggered an outing of pain in His native Argentina And all over the world.

Maradona suffered a heart attack at his rented house in Tigre, a district rich in the north by the capital of Argentina, Buenos Aires, where he recovered from a surgery to remove a blood clot on his brain earlier.

Widely perceived as one of the greatest players of the sport, Maradona Faimos led Argentina to victory in the 1986 World Cup And it inspired the compatriots with a story of rags who slip from poverty in the hardcrabble periphery in Buenos Aires to international reverence.

Maradona fought with drug addiction, obesity and alcoholism for decades and was supposed to be close to death in 2000 and 2004. But prosecutors concluded that – – Would not have been for the negligence of his doctors – His death could have been avoided.

Seven of the eight medical professionals who have been charged in this case, including the Maradona brain surgeon, the psychiatrist and the nurses, I am now a process for guilty homicidea crime approximately proportional to involuntary murder.

They deny the crimes, but they could face up to 25 years in prison. A court of three judges will convene in the suburb of Buenos Aires leaves in San Isidro to hear arguments on the case on Tuesday.

Who is in the process?

Neurologist Maradona, Leopoldo Luque, served as Maradona’s personal doctor for years and performed the operation that removed his brain’s blood clot on November 3, 2020.

Luque supervised the transition of the hospital at home of Maradona after the surgery. The rapid discharge raised questions at that time, with some experts suggesting that Maradona should have stayed longer in the hospital after his surgery.

Psychiatrist Agustina Cosachov prescribed Maradona’s medicines. It was not detected alcohol or illegal drugs in the toxicology test performed after Maradona’s death. The report said, however, that Maradona has psychotropic drugs for anxiety and depression in his system when he died.

The other five defendants this week include: Carlos Diaz, a addiction specialist who supervised Maradona treatment for alcohol addiction; Nancy Forlini, a doctor who helped manage Maradona’s home care; Mariano Perroni, medical assistance coordinator; Ricardo Almirón, another assistant who tended to the former athlete and Pedro Pablo di Spagna, clinical doctor.

A third assistant, Gisela Dahiana Madrid, asked to be judged separately at a later date.

How did these accusations occur?

The prosecutor brought together a medical council made up of a dozen experts – including forensic doctors, cardiologists, psychiatrists and toxicologists – to see if there is evidence about Maradona doctors who commit guilty homicide.

In an explosive report of 2021, the Board of Directors accused the medical team of the football star of acting in a “inadequate, deficient and reckless” way.

“The confinement at home did not comply with the norms and protocols,” the report shows.

Experts also questioned why Maradona was released so soon from the hospital after his operation, when he could not take care of him and did not have limited access or without any access to critical medical devices, such as an oxygen tube and a defibrillator, which administers an electric shock to restore the heart rate.

The team’s failure to properly monitor Maradona contributed to his death, established the group, established, Describing his treatment as hidden from “deficiencies and irregularities”.

For example, the report said, the doctors overlooked the “unusual swelling of the body” of Maradona, a sign of possible heart failure. Maradona agonized more than 12 hours before his heart attack, the panel added. The exacerbation of concerns, Maradona did not suffer any heart test or laboratory in the two weeks, which led to his death.

In order to make the case, the criminal prosecution will present over 120,000 messages and audio records from private conversations between doctors and others involved in Maradona care.

What do the defendants say?

All eight medical professionals deny any crime. They described Maradona as a difficult patient, who resisted treatment.

“Death took place unexpectedly, suddenly, during sleep hours, without giving us any time,” said Luque, the neurologist. In response to the report of the dizzy medical panel, Defense and ordered his own medical -legal study To support his statement that Maradona’s death “was sudden and without agony.”

Luque stressed that Maradona himself insisted on home hospitalization.

How were Maradona’s last days?

Maradona retired during the height of the coronavirus pandemic, as his chronic health problems made him more vulnerable to infecting and more likely to get sick.

Isolation broke out depression and anxiety for the superstar in early 2020, according to hundreds of pages of judicial documents analyzed by Associated Press. Maradona has appealed to alcohol, a vice that has long played a role in its disturbed inheritance.

As a reliable doctor of Maradona, Luque performed a series of medical tests and discovered a subdural hematoma or bleeding around the brain. After receiving emergency surgery, Maradona left the hospital and headed for a rented house near his older daughters. Doctors encouraged him to undergo treatment for his alcoholism at a clinic, but Maradona will accept nothing but outpatient care.

How will the process continue?

The process is expected to last until July, with at least three planned hearings each week. On the day of opening the trial, the prosecutors will read the indictment before the testimony of the witnesses begins.

After more than three months and about 110 witnesses, the criminal prosecution and defense will make their cases, and the court will establish once for a verdict. None of the defendants is likely to be detained before or during the trial.