A medical examiner’s report on the death of Argentine soccer legend Diego Maradona on Monday cast doubt on the criminal negligence trial of the eight medical workers involved in his case. It was brought a month before the commencement of the hearing.
A forensic expert conducted the study at the behest of one of the main defendants, Maradona’s neurosurgeon Leopoldo Luc, in an attempt to challenge a 2021 medical examination that found Luc and other doctors responsible for his football concussion. The star’s otherwise avoidable death. The defendants have denied any violations or irregularities in the treatment of Maradona.
Maradona, best known for leading Argentina to victory in the 1986 World Cup and a return to the final four years later, died in 2020 of a heart attack while recovering from brain surgery.
His death at the age of 60 stunned and devastated a generation of football fans and sent the whole of Argentina into mourning. Within days, the country was engulfed in questions about her final, troubled hours, a frenzy of suspicion that intensified when police officers raided her doctors’ homes and offices and Maradona’s family pressured the judiciary to intervene.
Prosecutors eventually charged the eight medical workers with murder — a serious charge that leaves open the possibility of premeditated intent and carries a prison sentence of eight to 25 years. The trial is scheduled to begin on June 4.
Medical examiner Pablo Ferrari’s report, released Monday, concluded that Maradona’s rapid, irregular heartbeat was either natural or caused by an “external” factor, possibly a drug such as cocaine. which Maradona was known to use in the past. Ferrari said they could not report toxicity based on Maradona’s insufficient urine sample.
These findings contradict the findings of the 20-member medical panel appointed to investigate Maradona’s death.
That 2021 report accused Maradona’s medical team of “acting inappropriately, poorly and negligently”, leaving the footballer in agony and without help more than 12 hours before his death.
Ferrari’s report disputed the severity of the episode, claiming that the arrhythmia could not have caused more than “a few minutes or at most a few hours” of agony.
“This marks a fundamental turning point in the case,” Vadim Mesenchuk, a defense lawyer representing Maradona’s psychologist, Augustina Kosachev, told local media. “A heart attack is a cardiac event lasting several days that lasts for minutes.”
The prosecutor’s office criticized the expert’s report as hastily compiled in 72 hours and accused Ferrari of ignoring four years of evidence in favor of “minimal evidence presented by the defense”. .
Prosecutors said there was no turning point in the case.
Credit : www.independent.co.uk