Bolsonaro ordered to start serving 27-year prison sentence for coup plot

Brazil’s Supreme Court has ordered that right-wing former president Jair Bolsonaro begin serving his prison sentence of 27 years and three months for plotting a coup after he lost the last election.

Justice Alexandre de Moraes on Tuesday ruled that the case had reached its final judgement and that no further appeals were possible.

Bolsonaro, 70, was found guilty of leading a conspiracy aimed at keeping him in power after he lost the 2022 election to his left-wing rival, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

He will begin serving his sentence in a federal police jail cell in the capital, Brasilia, where he has been detained since Saturday after being deemed a flight risk and removed from home detention.

At a hearing on Sunday, Bolsonaro admitted trying to open his ankle monitor with a soldering iron until he “came to his senses”, court documents show.

He said he had had no intention of fleeing and blamed medicine-induced “paranoia” for damage he caused to the monitor.

Justice Moraes on Tuesday mandated that full-time medical care be given to Bolsonaro, whose medical team has previously said he is suffering from worsening health.

Supreme Court justices said in September, when Bolsonaro was found guilty of plotting a coup, that he had known of plans to assassinate Lula and his vice-presidential running mate, Geraldo Alckmin, and to arrest and execute Moraes, who has been overseeing Bolsonaro’s trial.

The conspiracy failed to get the backing of the army and air force commanders. Lula was sworn in without incident on 1 January 2023.

But a week later, on 8 January, thousands of Bolsonaro supporters stormed government buildings in Brasília. The security forces intervened and about 1,500 people were arrested.

The justices found that the rioters had been incited by Bolsonaro, whose plan, they said, was for the military to step in and return him to power.

Bolsonaro was also barred from running for public office until 2060 – eight years after the end of his sentence.

The former president called the trial a “witch hunt” designed to prevent him running in the 2026 presidential election.