Leopoldo Luque, Maradona's personal doctor
Credit: JAVIER GONZALEZ TOLEDO /AFP
Investigators probing the death of football legend Diego Maradona have ordered a search of his personal physician’s home and office amid local reports they are now treating it as a possible case of manslaughter.
The searches began Sunday morning. Prosecutors behind the order, said to have been sanctioned by a judge, are understood to be trying to establish whether Maradona was the victim of medical negligence.
The dramatic twist in the probe into the 60-year-old’s death followed overnight reports he had rowed with personal physician Leopoldo Luque in the days before he suffered a fatal heart failure last Wednesday.
Local TV stations broadcast images of police entering Luque’s clinic.
The searches were ordered after Maradona’s daughters Dalma and Giannina gave statements on Saturday questioning whether the medication their father was receiving was appropriate.
Argentinian media are reporting that Mr Luque could be questioned as an ‘imputado’, someone who is under official investigation on suspicion of possible mala praxis or negligence, rather than a simple witness. Mr Luque was not at the rented home Maradona was using when he died and there is no suggestion at this stage that he will be charged with any crime.
A judicial source told respected Argentinian newspaper La Nacion: “As Luque was Maradona’s personal physician the decision was taken to search his house and surgery to look for documents that could determine whether, during Maradona’s treatment at home, there were any irregularities.”
Investigators are believed to be searching for details of the medicine being administered to Maradona as well as his health records and other documents that could play a key role in the investigation.
Thirty police and judicial officials are said to be at Luque’s home and another at his work address.
State prosecutors are also analysing CCTV footage of the cameras on the estate where Diego was living and the mobile phones of the nurses who were looking after him in the hours leading up to his death.
Maradona’s lawyer Matias Morla last week demanded a top-level probe into the emergency response to the former Naples and Barcelona star’s death.
Mr Morla complained Maradona had not received any medical checks in the 12 hours before he died, appearing to heap more pressure on the former footballer’s personal physician Leopoldo Luque.
On Saturday it emerged Maradona’s nurse had admitted she lied about an early-morning check-up on Maradona.
The sensational confession added more mystery to the circumstances surrounding his untimely death.
A night-shift nurse told investigators he had seen Maradona “sleeping and breathing normally in bed” around 6.30am on Wednesday.
Another nurse’s report in the hands of state prosecutors heading a probe into the retired footballer’s death, leaked to Argentinian media, states: “At 6.30am I started my shift and the patient was resting.
“At 7.30am he is heard moving around inside his room. At 8.30am he continues to rest. At 9.20am he refuses to have his vital signs monitored.”
The health report for private medical firm Medidom is now at the centre of an ongoing probe after the nurse reportedly told investigators she had never entered Diego’s bedroom the morning of his death to check up on him.
Local news agency Telam, citing judicial sources, said the nurse had claimed in her second statement under oath that she had been “made to lie” for the Medidom report.
It was not made crystal clear if she was claiming her bosses had obliged her to file the “false” report amid concerns they would be accused of negligence over Maradona’s death, or her hand had been forced by others.
The former Naples and Barcelona star, who was just 60, was declared dead around midday on Wednesday. Initial post-mortem results revealed the recovering cocaine addict, who also had alcohol problems, had suffered heart failure which caused a pulmonary edema.
Pulmonary edema, fluid accumulation in the lung’s tissue and air spaces, are caused by heart problems in most cases.
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