🔗 Share this article

Bolsonaro has been detained after authorities concluded he posed a concrete flight risk while under house arrest.

The one-time leader was sentenced of plotting a military coup in the ninth month and given more than over two decades in jail, but he was staying under home detention pending appeals.

High Court Judge Justice Moraes said the decision to arrest the elderly politician was a safety action after recent developments emerged.

This involved seeking to disable his tracking device and a call for a public vigil that could "allow for a chance to flee".

Court Filing Details Escape Risks

In a filing authorising the custody, the judge said information from the facility tracking his home detention suggested the former leader's "intention to break the tracking monitor to guarantee victory in his escape.

This, it said, would be made easier by the confusion caused by the demonstration called by his offspring.

His son, Flávio, who holds office as a senator, called for a gathering of his backers near the former president's residence to take place on the weekend.

The senator wrote on online platforms on last Friday: Do you plan to struggle for your nation, or see it all from your phone there on your sofa? I urge you to fight with us."

He said the gathering would be so supporters could "pray for his physical condition and for the reestablishment of democratic governance in our land."

Diplomatic Refuge Fears

Part of the magistrate's decision was the chance of his transfer to foreign missions near the residence, considering that the probes revealed a record of organizing to ask for protection through a consular facility", a statement said.

The judicial paperwork underscores that the US embassy in the federal district, Brasilia, is positioned around approximately 13 kilometers from the former president's residence.

Global Responses

His judicial problems have generated frustration from fellow conservative nationalist American leader President Trump, leading him to implement a half-rate duty on imports of Brazilian goods.

Bolsonaro is being held in a federal law enforcement building in the capital and will have a imprisonment assessment on Sunday.

Recent Judicial Appeals

It was only on the previous day that the former president's lawyers asked the Supreme Court to authorize him to fulfill his full incarceration period under home confinement, with digital surveillance.

They also requested that he be permitted to leave his home for medical care, saying he required ongoing care for respiratory ailments and other ailments.

Context of Sentencing

The former president was convicted of orchestrating a conspiracy aimed at retaining his authority after he lost the national vote to his political opponent, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

Supreme Court justices said that he was aware of a scheme which included plans to murder Lula and his vice-presidential running mate, his vice-presidential candidate, and to imprison and murder Justice Moraes - the High Court judge who has been presiding over the former president's case.

The conspiracy was thwarted because it didn't receive the endorsement of the armed forces officials. Lula was inaugurated without incident on 1 January 2023.

But a seven days after, on 8 January, numerous his followers stormed and vandalised government buildings in the national capital, Brasília.

The law enforcement stepped in and around 1,500 people were arrested.

The justices found that the demonstrators had been incited by the former president whose plan, they said, was for the country's army to step in, bring back stability and reinstate his authority.

At the moment, the legal team called the 27 years and three months sentence unreasonably severe".

He was also banned from running for public office until 2060 - a decade minus two years after the end of his sentence.

The ex-leader called the trial a political persecution and said it was intended to stop him participating in the 2026 presidential election.