The former Brazilian president arrested after being declared a risk of fleeing
The former Brazilian leader has been detained after authorities concluded he posed a concrete flight risk while under home confinement.
The former head of state was found guilty of plotting a military coup in September and handed more than a 27-year term in incarceration, but he remained under home detention pending court reviews.
Top Judicial Official the presiding justice said the action to imprison the elderly politician was a safety action after "new facts" emerged.
This involved seeking to disable his tracking device and a summons to a public vigil that could "allow for a potential flight.
Judicial Records Show Escape Risks
In a filing authorising the arrest, the judge said information from the unit overseeing his home detention suggested the former leader's "intention to break the tracking monitor to guarantee victory in his flight.
This, it said, would be "facilitated by the chaos caused by the demonstration called by his son.
His son, his son Flávio, who holds office as a legislator, called for a meeting of his followers near his father's house to take place on Saturday evening.
The senator wrote on online platforms on Friday: Do you plan to struggle for your homeland, or watch 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 health and for the reestablishment of democratic governance in our country."
Foreign Shelter Risks
Part of the judge's determination was the chance of his transfer to embassies near the home, considering that the investigations revealed a record of organizing to ask for protection through a diplomatic representation", a declaration said.
The judicial paperwork highlights that the United States embassy in the capital, Brazil's capital, is located around 8 miles from his dwelling.
Global Responses
The former president's legal troubles have drawn the ire of fellow populist conservative US President Trump, causing 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 imprisonment assessment on the next day.
Recent Judicial Appeals
It was only on last Friday that the former president's lawyers asked the Top Court to allow him to serve his whole jail sentence under domestic detention, with electronic monitoring.
They also petitioned that the former president be permitted to leave his home for healthcare, saying he required frequent medical attention for respiratory ailments and other ailments.
Details of Guilty Verdict
Bolsonaro was convicted of orchestrating a scheme aimed at retaining his authority after he failed to win the national vote to his ideological adversary, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Top judicial officials said that he knew of a scheme which involved plans to kill his opponent and his VP candidate, Geraldo Alckmin, and to imprison and murder Justice Moraes - the Supreme Court justice who has been presiding over the former president's case.
The plot was stopped because it didn't receive the endorsement of the armed forces officials. His successor was sworn in without issue on January 1st, 2023.
But a week later, on the eighth of January, thousands of Bolsonaro supporters stormed and vandalised official structures in the federal district, Brazil's capital.
The police intervened and around fifteen hundred individuals were arrested.
The judges found that the protesters had been encouraged by the former president whose strategy, they said, was for the Brazilian military to take action, reestablish control and reinstate his authority.
At the moment, his attorneys called the decades-long sentence "absurdly excessive.
He was also barred from running for public office until twenty-sixty - a decade minus two years after the completion of his term.
The former president called the court case a political persecution and said it was aimed at blocking him running in the 2026 presidential election.