Jair Bolsonaro arrested after being deemed a flight risk
Bolsonaro has been arrested after authorities found he posed a concrete flight risk while under house arrest.
The former head of state was convicted of planning a government overthrow in the ninth month and handed more than 27 years in jail, but he remained under confinement pending court reviews.
Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes said the action to imprison the 70-year-old politician was a safety action after fresh information came to light.
This included attempting to break his electronic bracelet and a call for a demonstration that could facilitate a chance to flee".
Judicial Records Show Escape Concerns
In a document approving the custody, the judge said intelligence from the centre monitoring the former president's confinement suggested the ex-president's "intention to break the electronic ankle bracelet to ensure success in his flight.
This, it said, would be "facilitated by the chaos caused by the gathering called by his offspring.
His child, his son Flávio, who serves as a legislator, called for a assembly of his backers near Bolsonaro's home to take place on Saturday night.
The senator wrote on social media on Friday: Will you battle for your nation, or watch it all from your smartphone there on your sofa? I invite you to struggle with us."
He said the gathering would be so supporters could offer prayers for his health and for the restoration of democratic rule in our land."
Diplomatic Refuge Fears
Part of Justice Moraes's ruling was the chance of the former president's move to embassies near the dwelling, considering that the probes revealed a background of arranging to ask for protection through a embassy office", a announcement said.
The legal document underscores that the US embassy in the federal district, Brazil's capital, is located around 8 miles from the former president's residence.
International Reactions
The former president's legal troubles have drawn the ire of fellow populist conservative American leader Donald Trump, leading him to enact a half-rate duty on Brazilian product imports.
Bolsonaro is being detained in a Federal Police station in the capital and will undergo a imprisonment assessment on the following day.
Recent Legal Requests
It was only on last Friday that the former president's lawyers asked the High Court to permit him to fulfill his full incarceration period under home confinement, with electronic monitoring.
They also petitioned that he be permitted to leave his home for medical care, saying he demanded regular treatment for lung conditions and other ailments.
Context of Sentencing
The former president was determined responsible of orchestrating a scheme aimed at keeping him in power after he failed to win the 2022 election to his ideological adversary, Lula.
High Court judges said that he had knowledge of a scheme which encompassed plans to assassinate the current president and his VP candidate, his vice-presidential candidate, and to arrest and execute the presiding judge - the top judicial official who has been overseeing the former president's case.
The plot was stopped because it couldn't obtain the endorsement of the military leaders. Lula was sworn in without incident on the first day of 2023.
But a week later, on the eighth of January, numerous Bolsonaro supporters invaded and destroyed official structures in the federal district, the capital city.
The police intervened and around fifteen hundred individuals were detained.
The magistrates found that the demonstrators had been provoked by the former president whose strategy, they said, was for the country's army to intervene, reestablish control and bring him back to power.
At the moment, the legal team called the over 27-year sentence "absurdly excessive.
He was also prohibited from seeking elected position until the year 2060 - eight years later after the conclusion of his imprisonment.
The former president called the legal proceedings a political persecution and said it was designed to prevent him competing in the 2026 national vote.