BUENOS AIRES: Four years after the death of Argentine football legend Diego Maradona, seven healthcare professionals will go on trial next week accused of negligence during his final days.
More than 100 witnesses, including members of Maradona’s family and doctors who tended to him down the years, will take the stand over the course of the four-month trial, which starts on Tuesday (Mar 11) in the Buenos Aires suburb of San Isidro.
The seven defendants risk between eight and 25 years in jail if convicted.
THE FACTS
Diego Armando Maradona died on Nov 25, 2020, at the age of 60 while recovering from brain surgery for a blood clot, after decades of battling cocaine and alcohol addictions.
He was found dead in bed in a rented house in an exclusive Buenos Aires neighbourhood where he was brought after being discharged from the hospital two weeks after surgery.
He was found to have died of a heart attack.
The night nurse said he had seen some “warning signs” but had “received orders not to wake him up”.
Maradona’s death, which came in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, plunged Argentina into deep mourning.
Tens of thousands of people queued to bid farewell to him as his body lay in state in the presidential palace.
