🔗 Share this article

Jair Bolsonaro has been arrested after authorities found he posed a concrete flight risk while under home confinement.

The one-time leader was sentenced of planning a armed takeover in the ninth month and given more than a 27-year term in jail, but he was staying under house arrest pending legal challenges.

Top Judicial Official Justice Moraes said the decision to arrest the elderly politician was a safety action after "new facts" emerged.

This involved seeking to disable his tracking device and a call for a supporters' gathering that could "allow for a possible escape.

Court Filing Details Escape Risks

In a paperwork permitting the detention, the magistrate said information from the centre monitoring Bolsonaro's house arrest suggested the one-time head of state's aim to disable the tracking monitor to ensure success in his escape.

This, it said, would be made easier by the disorder caused by the demonstration called by his child.

His son, his son Flávio, who works as a congressional representative, called for a assembly of his supporters near the former president's residence to take place on the weekend.

The senator wrote on online platforms on the previous day: "Are you going to fight for your homeland, or observe everything from your phone there on your settee? I call on you to battle with us."

He said the gathering would be so supporters could offer prayers for his well-being and for the restoration of democratic rule in our nation."

Foreign Shelter Risks

Part of Justice Moraes's ruling was the chance of the former president's move to embassies near the home, considering that the inquiries revealed a history of organizing to ask for protection through a consular facility", a announcement said.

The legal document highlights that the United States embassy in the federal district, the capital city, is situated around approximately 13 kilometers from his dwelling.

Worldwide Consequences

Bolsonaro's legal woes have generated frustration from fellow conservative nationalist US President Trump, leading him to impose a fifty percent tax on imports of Brazilian goods.

Bolsonaro is being kept in a national police facility in the capital and will undergo a custody hearing on the following day.

Recent Judicial Appeals

It was only on last Friday that the former president's lawyers asked the Top Court to allow him to complete his entire prison term under house arrest, with electronic monitoring.

They also requested that he be authorized to leave his home for medical treatment, saying he demanded ongoing care for respiratory ailments and other health problems.

Context of Sentencing

The former president was convicted of leading a scheme aimed at keeping him in power after he lost the presidential race to his left-wing rival, President Lula.

Supreme Court justices said that he knew of a plot which involved plans to murder his opponent and his vice-presidential running mate, his vice-presidential candidate, and to imprison and murder Justice Moraes - the top judicial official who has been overseeing Bolsonaro's trial.

The plot was stopped because it didn't receive the support of the military leaders. His successor was inaugurated without issue on January 1st, 2023.

But a following week, on the eighth of January, thousands of his backers attacked and damaged government buildings in the federal district, Brasília.

The police stepped in and around 1,500 people were taken into custody.

The magistrates found that the demonstrators had been encouraged by Bolsonaro whose strategy, they said, was for the country's army to take action, reestablish control and bring him back to power.

At the moment, Bolsonaro's lawyers called the decades-long sentence extremely harsh.

He was also prohibited from campaigning for office until the year 2060 - eight years after the completion of his term.

The one-time head of state called the trial a "witch hunt and said it was designed to prevent him running in the 2026 presidential election.