Lola Monjero Endures Another Year of Ordeal Awaiting Trial: “My Son Didn’t Have to Die”
The anguish of Lola Montero shows no signs of abating. Seven years after her son Pedro’s death at the General Hospital of Fuerteventura, the mother is still waiting for the courts to decide whether criminal responsibility can be attached to a series of failures that she believes turned a preventable tragedy into a fatal one.
The trial, which was scheduled for a few weeks ago, has been postponed again because the expert witnesses were unable to attend the three dates set by the judge.
The prosecution is seeking two and a half years of imprisonment for five doctors – three emergency physicians, a gastroenterology specialist and a surgeon. In addition, the anesthesiologist who took part in the surgery is currently under a warrant after failing to appear to give testimony. The family has asked that the trial proceed without him if he remains missing.
A doubtful test and a treatment that should never have been given
Pedro arrived in Fuerteventura already diagnosed with Crohn’s disease. His island‑based specialist decided to start him on an immunosuppressive therapy that weakens the immune system and requires that infections such as tuberculosis be ruled out beforehand. The test performed – the Mantoux tuberculin skin test – did not yield a clear result.
“It seems that in medicine there is no such thing as a doubtful test… If this test is inconclusive, they should have done another one,” Montero lamented.
It was not repeated. Nevertheless, the treatment was started.
A few weeks later, at the end of November 2017, Pedro began suffering from very high fevers of up to 39.8–40 °C and a general deterioration. He visited the emergency department four times.
On one of those visits he was diagnosed with a urinary infection, even though, according to his mother, “the lab results were all over the place… nothing was within normal parameters.” Pedro himself told his mother, “Mom, they say I have a urinary infection, but I don’t have one.”
Despite the doubts, both he and his mother placed great trust in the gastroenterology specialist – who saw him both in emergencies and in outpatient consultations – and the family agreed to continue the treatment even as his condition worsened.
“It’s the best we have, we have to give it time,” the doctor told him on 9 January, days before Pedro’s condition deteriorated dramatically.
A delayed operation and a devastating diagnosis
On 29 January 2018 Pedro arrived at the hospital in a critical state: severe bleeding, extreme weight loss and obvious dehydration. He was admitted and operated on the following day.
The surgeon who performed the operation informed the family that Pedro’s small intestine showed multiple micro‑perforations, forcing the removal of almost the entire organ. After surgery, Pedro spent a week on the ward without improvement.
On 5 February he was transferred to the intensive care unit, where doctors delivered the fatal news:
“Your son has bilateral pneumonia… and he also has tuberculosis that has reached his bone marrow. There’s nothing we can do for him.”
Pedro died on 18 February 2018. “My son didn’t have to be dead,” the mother repeats today, citing the forensic report and the judicial investigation, which conclude that his death could have been avoided.
“No one gave me an explanation”
Beyond the loss, Lola denounces the absolute abandonment she felt at the hospital.
“No one gave me an explanation… Everyone disappeared.”
Even after requesting a meeting with the responsible parties, the only person she managed to speak with was the head nurse, who had never seen her son in her life. She believes a pattern of neglect and poor coordination prevailed:
“They have gone through a swarm of doctors, and nobody looked at a lab test, nobody looked at a report…”
Today she says her fight is not only for Pedro, but to prevent other patients from experiencing the same ordeal:
“I don’t want any child to return to the hospital and find themselves in this situation.”
The suspended mourning
Emotion runs through the entire interview; tears are inevitable when Lola recalls her son. She does not ask for prison sentences for the responsible parties; she wants the prosecution to proceed.
“We are in a second instance because, in the first, the judge here said she saw no indication of a crime, but in Las Palmas they did see indications,” she emphasizes.
Lola’s sole demand is to know the truth.
“I only seek justice.”
Exhausted and yearning to close this chapter, she wishes to “let Pedro go” and focus on grieving.
“I need to free myself from this burden,” she confesses, while admitting that she still feels as if she is holding him by the hand until everything is finally resolved.