In 2020, the Argentina icon, widely recognized as one of the greatest footballers in history, died of a heart attack. Prosecutors have demanded that the medical personnel who treated Diego Maradona before his death be charged with “negligent homicide.”
Maradona died in November 2020 at his home in Buenos Aires, Argentina, after suffering a heart attack after undergoing successful surgery to remove a brain blood clot. The former Napoli and Barcelona player, who also helped Argentina win the 1986 World Cup, was only 60 years old when he died, but he had a long history of health issues, as well as drug and alcohol abuse.
On Wednesday, prosecutors investigating Maradona’s death requested that eight members of the medical team charged with his care go on trial for placing him in a “situation of helplessness”. Leopoldo Luque, Maradona’s family doctor and neurosurgeon, was the man primarily in charge of his health alongside psychiatrist Agustina Cosachov, but six others have also been accused of “simple homicide with dolus eventualis” in a court filing, which has been cited by the official Telam news agency. The report states that the defendants “were the protagonists of an unprecedented, totally deficient and reckless hospitalisation at home” and were allegedly responsible for “a series of improvisations, mismanagement and shortcomings”.
The defendants will now be given the opportunity to put forward their arguments, and could also request that the case be dismissed. Should they be found guilty of any wrongdoing, it has been reported that they could face between eight to 25 years in prison.