🔗 Share this article

He contested the legal system and the legal system prevailed.

Two months following getting a quarter-century plus sentence for trying to “destroy” the nation's democracy, ex-president Jair Bolsonaro at last appears destined for incarceration.

Anticipated Jailing

The adjudicated instigator – who had been under house arrest in his estate while a series of court processes and petitions play out – is largely predicted to be imprisoned in the near future, amid increasing talk that he will be moved to a infamous top-security facility.

Past Statements on Inmates

Over Bolsonaro’s four-decade public life, the right-wing ex- military man exhibited scant compassion for the country's inmates.

“What’s the need to give those dirtbags a comfortable existence?” he once mused. “They deserve to be messed, end of story. That's my view.”

On another occasion, Bolsonaro proclaimed: “Unless you desire to finish behind bars, you simply need is to avoid sexual assault, kidnap or theft.”

Prison Facility Speculation

However the prospect of Bolsonaro himself ending up in the Papuda maximum security prison in Brasília has horrified allies, several of whom this week inspected the complex in an apparent bid to dissuade the judiciary from sending him there.

The senator, a senator from Bolsonaro’s Liberal party who was part of that quartet, stated he predicted the septuagenarian leader to be imprisoned in the following week and a half and feared his assigned prison could be Papuda.

Lucas claimed Bolsonaro’s severe intestinal ailments – the result of a almost deadly knife attack during the 2018 presidential election race – implied it would be hazardous to keep the former president there. “His condition is highly critical. He will not be able to manage if they take him to Papuda … It would be terrible,” said the senator, who also expressed concern about packed cells and the standard of jail cuisine.

When inspecting Papuda, Lucas recalled observing cells holding forty inmates: “It's virtually one square meter per inmate.

“We talked to the convicts and they complain, of course, of the terrible meals,” remarked the senator.

Supporters Voice Concerns

The senator isn't the lone figure expressing views ahead of the former president’s expected imprisonment.

Writing in a leading daily, a different supporter, the former communications minister Fábio Wajngarten, bemoaned the “brutal” conclusion to Bolsonaro’s “flawless” political career and claimed Brazil was about to witness “the biggest wrong in its past”.

“This is an wrong that erodes the hearts of millions people in Brazil,” he stated.

Divided Popular Opinion

It is possibly correct considering the significant support Bolsonaro maintains on the Brazilian right. But his predicted incarceration has also warmed the feelings of numerous others who think he ought to be imprisoned for planning to stop the incoming president from assuming office – and even plotting to have him assassinated.

Congressman Otoni, a politician for the incumbent administration's Workers’ party, stated: “No one wishes Bolsonaro to be put in a dungeon. Not a soul desires Bolsonaro to be sent in segregation. Nobody wishes Bolsonaro to go hungry or for him to have to lie on concrete. We wish him to get proper treatment – but proper handling while incarcerated. He can’t carry on being his self-appointed guard for his entire life.”

The congressman noted how Bolsonaro backers, who have spent years applauding the severe handling of convicts, had abruptly become aware to their rights. “Only now has the extreme right – which has consistently asserted that basic rights are not for criminals – opted to visit a penitentiary to learn what conditions are really like,” he stated.

“The former president is a offender,” Otoni insisted, but that did not mean he deserved “humiliating, insulting handling”.

Possible Incarceration Facilities

Regardless of talk that Bolsonaro could be sent to Papuda, which now holds about 14,000 detainees, his more likely assigned facility looks to be a adjacent prison for law enforcement and other “particular” prisoners referred to as Papudinha (Small Papuda).

His potential cell are much more comfortable than those in the larger jail, although nevertheless a far cry from the comfort Bolsonaro enjoyed while residing in the spectacular presidential palace, around 12 miles away.

According to sources, the room Bolsonaro could anticipate occupy in Papudinha has about 24 square meters – roughly the area of a couple of car spots – and features a 12 square meter restroom with a shower and a 12 square meter veranda. “The ex-president might be allowed to have a television and even a minibar in his cell as long as they were donated by his family,” sources indicated.

Partisan Responses

He criticized the rumoured idea to send the former leader to Papuda as “an act of retaliation” on the part of the supreme court judge who oversaw Bolsonaro’s proceedings and will rule on his fate in the {