Diego Maradona was left to suffer in “agony” for at least 12 hours before his death, a forensic expert has told a Buenos Aires court.
Seven medics stand trial as they have been facing accusations of effectively letting the football legend die.
Autopsy revelations, made public for the first time on Thursday, paint a grim picture of Maradona’s final hours at his Buenos Aires home in 2020.
Prosecutors allege his medical team – including a neurosurgeon, a psychiatrist, a psychologist, and several doctors and nurses – failed him miserably.
Carlos Cassinelli, director of forensic medicine at the Scientific Police Superintendency, told the court that Maradona’s heart was “completely covered in fat and blood clots,” clear indicators of prolonged agony.
“This was not a patient who should have been left at home,” Cassinelli declared. “His condition had been worsening for days – it was inevitable.”
The autopsy determined Maradona died from acute pulmonary oedema caused by congestive heart failure – a slow, painful decline rather than a sudden collapse.
Witnesses had previously testified that the footballing icon’s face and abdomen were alarmingly swollen in his final days. But, prosecutors said, the medics overseeing his care carried on regardless, showing an outrageous disregard for his deteriorating condition.
Among those on trial is Leopoldo Luque, Maradona’s physician, and psychiatrist Agustina Cosachov, who prescribed the drugs he was taking right up until his death.
The defendants are accused of “homicide with possible intent” – knowingly taking a course of action that could lead to their patient’s death. If convicted, they face between eight and 25 years behind bars.
Maradona, famous worldwide for leading Argentina to World Cup glory in 1986, died at 60 in a private residential complex north of Buenos Aires, just weeks after undergoing brain surgery.
Investigators claim his home care was riddled with negligence, branding it a catalogue of “serious mistakes” that sealed his fate.
The long-delayed trial, expected to last until July, will hear from nearly 120 witnesses – a legal battle set to expose shocking failings in the final chapter of Maradona’s extraordinary life.
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