Gianinna Maradona (Left), daughter of Argentine soccer legend Diego Maradona, leaves the courtroom corridor for a trial listening to on her father’s demise in San Isidro, Buenos Aires province, Argentina on April 21, 2026. — AFP
Diego Maradona’s entourage and medical workforce had a plan for the Argentine soccer star however issues “went out of control” within the lead-up to his demise, his daughter Gianinna mentioned in an interview this week.
Maradona, thought to be one of many biggest soccer gamers of all time, died in November 2020 on the age of 60 of coronary heart failure and acute pulmonary edema — a situation the place fluid accumulates within the lungs — whereas recovering at dwelling from surgical procedure for a mind clot.
She spoke on the sidelines of the trial in San Isidro of seven medical staff — together with a neurosurgeon, a psychiatrist and a nurse — whom prosecutors accuse of gross negligence over Maradona’s demise.
The seven deny duty and say the star of the 1986 World Cup died of pure causes. They face jail phrases of between eight and 25 years if convicted.
Gianinna blamed Maradona’s former lawyer and consultant Matias Morla and his former assistant Maximiliano Pomargo.
The pair usually are not among the many accused within the negligence case, however will stand trial for alleged fraudulent administration of Maradona’s manufacturers. The trial date has but to be introduced.
“I can’t quite bring myself to think through this plan, that they wanted to kill him. Did Morla want to have my father’s life in his hands? Surely,” Gianinna mentioned.
‘Energy’ over MaradonaÂ
Gianinna mentioned among the defendants satisfied the household in November 2020 that Maradona might solely get well from neurosurgery at dwelling, as an alternative of being admitted to a psychiatric clinic.
The clinic might have handled the soccer star’s addictions, but when Maradona refused to be admitted, he would possible have been positioned underneath a decide’s guardianship.
“It didn’t suit them for my father to be hospitalised in psychiatry, because a whole lot of things would have collapsed for Morla,” Gianinna mentioned.
She mentioned Maradona had given Morla energy of legal professional within the business use of his identify.
“He was the one who had the signature, who could sign as if he were my dad,” she mentioned.
“He had the power of having Maradona (under his control) and did whatever he wanted with that power,” Gianinna mentioned, including that these in his closest circle had been “always thinking about the money side of things, not about dad’s health.”
Gianinna testified on the trial final month and denounced Maradona’s “total manipulation.”
Prosecutors mentioned the footballer was saved in a home within the northern Buenos Aires suburb of Tigre with out applicable medical tools and sanitation, and that carers dedicated “all kinds of omissions” that resulted in “cruel” situations.
Gianinna mentioned she believed the seven defendants had been “all responsible, some to a greater degree than others.” She singled out Maradona’s then-personal doctor Leopoldo Luque because the “main voice” who managed his workforce.
Nonetheless, she mentioned every defendant bore private duty.
“The nurse who was supposed to check on him before leaving didn’t check on him, and the nurse who arrived didn’t check on him either,” she mentioned.
‘They had been afraid’
Professional stories say that Maradona died after a number of hours of agony, alone on the mattress in the home rented for his restoration.
Gianinna mentioned that the medical workforce members “all had a common line and they all followed it.”
She mentioned Pomargo, Maradona’s former right-hand man and Morla’s brother-in-law, was “the one who was pulling the strings a bit.”
When Maradona’s situation worsened, the carers “were afraid, because in the audio messages (used in the trial), you hear things like: ‘I’m covering myself legally,'” Gianinna mentioned.
“They never imagined that the prosecutor’s office would act quickly, seize their phones, raid their homes,” she mentioned.
