A former bodyguard of Diego Maradona was arrested Tuesday for allegedly giving false testimony in the trial of seven health professionals accused of criminal negligence in the late football legend’s medical care.
Julio Coria left the courtroom in the Buenos Aires suburb of San Isidro in handcuffs after judges ruled in favor of the prosecution’s claim that he had lied under oath.
Coria was present in the house were Maradona died under conditions prosecutors say amounted to negligence, and had tried to revive him with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, according to evidence before the court.
His seven-person medical team is on trial for what prosecutors have called the “horror theater” of the final days of his life.
Jana, one of the player’s five children who is a plaintiff in the case along with her siblings and Maradona’s sisters, told the court that she and her sister Gianinna had visited their father a week before his death but that he was “in bad humor.”
She said Maradona’s psychologist, who is among the defendants, had advised them to hold off on further visits “until he (Maradona) asked to see the family.”
She added that her father was “bloated” during the visit and echoed accounts from other witnesses that there was no medical equipment in the house.
Maradona died of heart failure and acute pulmonary edema — a condition where fluid accumulates in the lungs — two weeks after going under the knife.
Coria had tried to resuscitate him until doctors arrived at the house in the upmarket suburb of Tigre, near San Isidro, and declared him dead.
The bodyguard claimed in court Tuesday he had not spoken with Leopoldo Luque, Maradona’s personal physician and one of the defendants on trial.
But the investigation revealed multiple text messages between the two before and after Maradona’s death.
The prosecution interrupted Coria’s testimony several times, accusing him of “contradictions and omissions,” before asking for his arrest.
The seven defendants in the case are accused of “homicide with possible intent” — pursuing a course of action despite knowing it can lead to their patient’s death.
They risk prison terms of between eight and 25 years.
Prosecutors allege the footballer was abandoned to his fate for a “prolonged, agonizing period” before his death.
Nearly 120 witnesses are expected to testify in the long-delayed trial expected to run until July.
