The slowness of the Argentine justice system makes no exceptions, not even for popular heroes. Five and a half years after the death of Diego Armando Maradona, Argentinians know that his heart was monstrously large when it stopped beating: it weighed 503 grams, almost twice the weight of an average human heart.
They know that the footballer died of pulmonary edema resulting from acute heart failure. They know that three weeks earlier he had undergone surgery for a chronic subdural hematoma. They know that he was then transferred to a house to continue his recovery, from which he never emerged. But the justice system still owes them an answer: whether the sadness that swept the country—and beyond its borders—on November 25, 2020, could have been avoided.
Eight members of the medical team that cared for him in his final days have been in the dock for the second time since April. They are charged with alleged “homicide with implied malice,” meaning the prosecution maintains they acted negligently and recklessly, even knowing his health was hanging by a thread.
The defense is trying to convince the court otherwise, arguing that the patient had serious pre-existing health problems and that his heart, affected by dilated cardiomyopathy—a disease that weakens the heart muscle and enlarges the chambers—suddenly failed without warning. The verdict, which was expected in July, has now been postponed until at least August.
The idol’s frailty was an open secret. No one had forgotten that at the end of October, having just turned 60, the coach of Gimnasia y Esgrima de La Plata made a fleeting appearance at the stadium, barely able to walk. He dragged his legs and gasped for breath, sustained by the cheers of a crowd that paid him homage until the very end: “Diego, Diego, olé, olé, olé, Diego, Diego.”
The profane, boastful, and deceitful god that was Maradona lived surrounded by scandals, and these continue to haunt him even after his death. None surpasses the judicial disgrace caused by the annulment of the first trial in May of last year. Two months of hearings had already been held, and the court had heard 44 witnesses when it was discovered that one of the judges, Julieta Makintach, was participating in the filming of a secret documentary about the trial.
Images from the trailer for “Divine Justice” went viral. A tsunami of public outrage was directed against this judge who, lured by the allure of fame, had soared too high. She was booed in the streets and on social media, the courts removed her from office, and now she must answer a multimillion-dollar lawsuit filed by Maradona’s eldest daughters, Dalma and Gianinna.
With the trial annulled, a new trial was scheduled to begin on April 14. Since then, the Oral Criminal Court No. 7 of San Isidro, on the northern outskirts of Buenos Aires, has held hearings twice a week, every Tuesday and Thursday. None of the above is valid, but the feeling is that the game is rigged.
The prosecution and defense know the central arguments of many witnesses because they have heard them before, and they have revised their strategy. The most visible change is the main defendant, neurosurgeon Leopoldo Luque, who was in charge of supervising the team. The silence he maintained during the first trial contrasts sharply with his current eagerness to testify: he has done so six times in ten hearings.
