An Argentine judge ruled on Wednesday that eight health care workers involved in caring for soccer star Diego Maradona will be tried on charges of negligence.
The judge ruled that brain surgeon Leopoldo Luque and psychiatrist Agustina Cosachov were of the people to be tried for manslaughter. The trial is not scheduled to begin until late 2023 or early 2024.
Defendants have been accused of failing to take proper care of the Argentine legend while he was recovering from the fatal surgery.
The former Argentine captain died of cardiac arrest at the age of 60 on November 25, 2020, while recovering from surgery for a blood clot in the brain at his home in the suburbs of Buenos Aires.
A few days after his death, Argentine prosecutors began investigating the doctors and nurses involved in his treatment.
Diego Maradona’s Case is Being Treated as a Homicide
In 2021, the Medical Commission, tasked with investigating Maradona’s death, discovered that Maradona’s medical team acted “inappropriate, deficient and recklessly.”
It also noted that with proper treatment at an appropriate medical center, the footballer “would have had a better chance of surviving,” according to the court ruling.
In April, the prosecutor ordered Judge Orlando DÃaz to detain those under investigation for trial.
Maradona’s autopsy revealed that he died of natural causes, but Argentine law enforcement began investigating the case under pressure from Maradona’s family.
The Argentine footballer’s son’s lawyer, Mario Baudley, told Reuters that the world champion was “in a situation of helplessness” at the time of his death.
Maradona died on November 25, 2020, at the age of 60. “I fought for a long time and here we are, with this stage completed.” he said. “As soon as I saw the cause, I said it was a homicide.”
