"He was waiting for his doctor, who never came": Maradona's bodyguard reveals tragic details of his final days | Goal.com

Veröffentlicht am 04 Aug 2026 | Lesezeit: 2 Minuten

One of Diego Armando Maradona's guards has dropped a bombshell about the circumstances surrounding the Argentina legend's death.

According to the newspaper "Sport", Martín Aníbal Domínguez, one of Maradona's personal bodyguards, testified this Tuesday in the trial over "the death of the great star". He claimed that Maradona's personal doctor, Leopoldo Luque, failed to visit despite repeated warnings about the player's health.

The guard added: "He was supposed to come, as (Maradona) had recently undergone surgery. He was supposed to come, but he did not. And we were not able to deal with Diego, he was in a bad mood and treated everyone badly."

Part of Maradona's protection team, Domínguez was present in the house where the star died on 25 November 2020, while he was receiving home treatment.

"Every time I saw him, his face was swollen," the witness said, adding: "They were constantly asking me about how Diego was, and I would reply that he was suffering from fluid retention."

Prosecutors presented messages in which the personal guard warned Luque about the star's swelling and urged the doctor to visit him at home.

Asked by the public prosecutor about the reason for those messages, Domínguez replied: "Diego told the nurse that he was waiting for his personal doctor."

"Diego was not well, he did not want to bathe, he was not leaving his room, and he did not want to eat," the witness continued.

He added: "Monona (the cook) also told me that he was not going to the toilet. That is why they installed a bathroom in his room."

According to the testimony, Luque visited Maradona four times during the fourteen days the star spent in that house on the outskirts of Buenos Aires: on 17, 18, 20 and 22 November.

The doctor told others close to Maradona, who had raised concerns about his condition, that the swelling came from being confined to bed for a long period and that it would go away.

Maradona died as a result of "acute pulmonary oedema caused by an acute exacerbation of chronic heart failure", according to the autopsy report.

The forensic experts who examined the body also testified. They found three litres of fluid in Maradona's abdomen, and reported that the star showed signs of "generalised oedema (a widespread accumulation of fluid in the tissues of the whole body)", a condition that developed, according to them, over the course of several days.

Luque is not alone in the dock. Also being tried in this case are the psychiatrist Agustina Cosachov, the psychologist Carlos Díaz, the home care coordinator at the company Swiss Medical, Nancy Forlini, the doctor Pedro Di Spagna, the nursing coordinator Mariano Perroni, and the nurse Ricardo Almirón, all of them accused of involuntary manslaughter.

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