The former Brazilian leader has been taken into custody after authorities found he posed a concrete flight risk while under home confinement.
The ex-president was found guilty of planning a armed takeover in the ninth month and given more than over two decades in prison, but he continued under confinement pending legal challenges.
Top Judicial Official Alexandre de Moraes said the move to detain the septuagenarian politician was a safety action after fresh information came to light.
This encompassed seeking to disable his ankle monitor and a summons to a supporters' gathering that could facilitate a possible escape.
Judicial Records Show Escape Concerns
In a document approving the arrest, Justice Moraes said intelligence from the facility tracking Bolsonaro's house arrest suggested the former leader's aim to disable the tracking monitor to ensure success in his getaway".
This, it said, would be "facilitated by the disorder caused by the demonstration called by his son.
His son, Flávio, who serves as a senator, called for a gathering of his backers near the former president's residence to take place on the weekend.
His son wrote on digital networks on last Friday: "Are you going to fight for your country, or watch it all from your mobile device there on your settee? I urge you to fight with us."
He said the vigil would be so backers could "pray for his physical condition and for the return of democracy in our land."
Diplomatic Refuge Fears
Part of Justice Moraes's ruling was the chance of Bolsonaro's transfer to embassies near the dwelling, considering that the probes revealed a record of arranging to request asylum through a diplomatic representation", a announcement said.
The legal document highlights that the United States embassy in the federal district, Brasilia, is positioned around approximately 13 kilometers from Bolsonaro's home.
Worldwide Consequences
His judicial problems have drawn the ire of fellow populist conservative American leader Donald Trump, causing him to implement a 50% tariff on goods coming from Brazil.
He is being kept in a federal law enforcement building in the capital and will undergo a custody hearing on Sunday.
Latest Court Petitions
It was only on last Friday that the ex-leader's attorneys asked the Supreme Court to authorize him to serve his whole jail sentence under house arrest, with digital surveillance.
They also asked that Bolsonaro be authorized to leave his home for medical treatment, saying he demanded ongoing care for pulmonary infections and other ailments.
Context of Sentencing
Bolsonaro was determined responsible of leading a scheme aimed at retaining his authority after he lost the 2022 election to his political opponent, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
High Court judges said that he was aware of a plot which encompassed plans to assassinate the current president and his vice-presidential running mate, Geraldo Alckmin, and to detain and kill Alexandre de Moraes - the High Court judge who has been managing the former president's case.
The conspiracy was stopped because it didn't receive the endorsement of the military leaders. The current president was inaugurated without incident on 1 January 2023.
But a following week, on the eighth of January, thousands of his backers stormed and vandalised official structures in the national capital, Brasília.
The law enforcement stepped in and around fifteen hundred individuals were arrested.
The judges found that the demonstrators had been encouraged by him whose scheme, they said, was for the country's army to step in, bring back stability and bring him back to power.
At the period, Bolsonaro's lawyers called the 27 years and three months sentence extremely harsh.
He was also banned from seeking elected position until twenty-sixty - a decade minus two years after the end of his sentence.
The ex-leader called the legal proceedings a targeted investigation" and said it was intended to stop him participating in the 2026 national vote.
