After his defense team turned down a second appeal, Brazil’s Supreme Court has ordered former president Jair Bolsonaro to begin serving his 27-year prison sentence.
On Tuesday, Justice Alexandre de Moraes, a key witness in Bolsonaro’s case, made the announcement.
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Bolsonaro’s sentence was set to begin at the Federal Police’s current prison facility in Brasilia, where the court had previously stated.
After losing the 2022 presidential election, Bolsonaro was found guilty of plotting a coup in order to hold onto power.
He was found guilty of attempting a coup, supporting an armed conspiracy, causing damage to public property, and aggravating a listed national heritage site’s state of preservation.
He received a 27-year prison sentence and three-month prison term. However, that sentence did not allow for appeals right away.
Bolsonaro contests victory
Bolsonaro, a former army captain who served for nearly 27 years in the Chamber of Deputies before becoming president, was a member of Brazil’s far-right Liberal Party, also known as PL.
He led the country from 2019 to 2023. However, he was accused of swaying the electoral process in Brazil, and the country’s Supreme Electoral Court ruled in June 2023 that he had abused his position.
Bolsonaro ran for re-election in the 2022 election, but left-wing candidate Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva narrowly lost.
However, despite media reports suggesting that he might have conceded his defeat in private during a meeting with the Supreme Court, the right-wing leader refused to admit it publicly.
Bolsonaro and his supporters filed a legal challenge, contending that the election results contained “discrepancies.”
De Moraes at the time rejected the complaint, citing “bad faith” and “total absence of any evidence.” Bolsonaro’s team received a nearly $4.3 million fine as a result.
Bolsonaro’s supporters also staged protests in Brasilia, obstructing roads, and launching attacks on police headquarters.
One week after Lula was sworn in, the unrest reached its peak on January 8, 2023. Bolsonaro had briefly left the country, but supporters gathered at the Three Powers Plaza in Brasilia and stormed government buildings.
Numerous federal investigations were sparked by the riot. Additionally, the federal police released an 884-page report in November 2024 that detailed evidence they claimed Bolsonaro and his allies had conspired to overturn the election results.
According to testimony and testimony, Bolsonaro and his associates had hoped to stoke a military uprising to stop Lula from taking office and re-election.
According to the police, some military officers affiliated with Bolsonaro even suggested a plot to kill Lula and kill de Moraes.
A danger of flight
Bolsonaro was formally charged in February by the prosecution, who was later tried.
Bolsonaro’s defense has repeatedly portrayed the allegations as political maneuvers, and the ex-president has consistently maintained his innocence.
Donald Trump, the president of the United States, has also pressed the Brazilian government to drop the case, imposing 50 percent tariffs on some of its exports and calling the trial “witch hunt.”
Bolsonaro has been under house arrest since August because he fears he might try to flee to another country. He had already spent several nights in the Hungarian embassy in 2024, according to rumors that he might have sought diplomatic adolfaction from Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
A letter allegedly addressed to Argentine President Javier Milei in which Bolsonaro claimed he was being persecuted and sought political asylum was also recovered by police.
Bolsonaro’s request to overturn his prison sentence was rejected earlier this month.
Since then, his defense team has filed a petition for the 27-year prison term to be placed under house arrest for humanitarian reasons. Bolsonaro was stabbed while campaigning in 2018, and he still has abdominal issues.
He was later taken into custody by the police on Saturday after it was discovered that he had hacked into his ankle monitor.
Bolsonaro allegedly claimed to have had “hallucinatory” side effects from taking the medications he was taking. He denied that he was a danger of flying.
Source: Aljazeera
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