Prison Shock: Brazil's Ex-President Bolsonaro Confronts Life Behind Bars
He battled the legal system and justice prevailed.
Two months after getting a 27-year sentence for trying to “annihilate” the nation's democratic institutions, former president Jair Bolsonaro at last appears destined for incarceration.
Anticipated Imprisonment
The found-guilty coup-monger – who's been subject to home confinement in his mansion while a number of court processes and challenges play out – is broadly anticipated to be jailed in the near future, amidst mounting talk that he will be moved to a infamous top-security prison.
Historical Statements on Inmates
Over Bolsonaro’s four-decade political career, the conservative former military man displayed little compassion for Brazil’s inmates.
“Why should we provide those lowlifes a comfortable existence?” he once mused. “They ought to simply be screwed, end of story. That’s what I reckon.”
On another occasion, Bolsonaro proclaimed: “If you don’t want to end up in prison, all you have to do is not sexual assault, abduction or rob.”
Incarceration Destination Speculation
However the idea of Bolsonaro himself landing in the Papuda top-security prison in Brasília has shocked supporters, several of whom this week toured the prison in an seeming effort to discourage the supreme court from sending him there.
The senator, a politician from Bolsonaro’s allied group who was one of the visitors, stated he expected the 70-year-old politician to be jailed in the coming fortnight and feared his assigned prison could be Papuda.
Lucas claimed Bolsonaro’s serious intestinal issues – the result of a near-fatal assault during the 2018 presidential election race – signified it would be dangerous to keep the former president there. “His health is very grave. He won’t be able to manage if they send him to Papuda … It could be dreadful,” he commented, who also worried about cramped cells and the quality of prison meals.
When inspecting Papuda, Lucas recalled observing cells accommodating forty inmates: “It's virtually one square metre per prisoner.
“We talked to the inmates and they grumble, unsurprisingly, of the terrible food,” continued the senator.
Supporters React
The senator isn't the lone figure expressing views ahead of the former president’s anticipated incarceration.
Authoring in a leading newspaper, another ally, the ex- government official Fábio Wajngarten, deplored the “harsh” finale to Bolsonaro’s “flawless” time in office and claimed Brazil was about to witness “the biggest political injustice in its history”.
“It represents an injustice that gnaws the spirits of countless people in Brazil,” the former minister said.
Mixed Popular Response
This could be correct given the significant support Bolsonaro holds on the conservative side. However his anticipated imprisonment has also pleased the hearts of numerous individuals who think he should be imprisoned for conspiring to stop his successor from assuming office – and also plotting to have him assassinated.
Congressman Otoni, a congressman for the current president's Workers’ party, commented: “Nobody desires Bolsonaro to be placed in a hole. No one wants Bolsonaro to be sent in solitary confinement. No one desires Bolsonaro not to be fed or for him to have to lie on concrete. We desire him to get dignified handling – but dignified handling behind bars. He cannot continue being his own prison warden for his whole life.”
Otoni was struck by how Bolsonaro backers, who have for a long time praising the harsh conditions of prisoners, had abruptly woken up to their rights. “Recently has the extreme right – which has always argued that civil liberties are not for lawbreakers – opted to visit a jail to discover what conditions are truly like,” he said.
“Bolsonaro is a lawbreaker,” Otoni insisted, but that did not mean he merited “humiliating, demeaning treatment”.
Potential Prison Environment
In spite of talk that Bolsonaro could be sent to Papuda, which now holds about thousands of detainees, his probable assigned facility seems to be a nearby penitentiary for officers and other “unique” prisoners called Papudinha (Little Papuda).
Its cells are much more comfortable than those in the larger jail, although nevertheless a distant from the comfort Bolsonaro had while occupying the impressive presidential palace, approximately 12 miles away.
According to information, the accommodation Bolsonaro could likely inhabit in Papudinha is about 24 sq metres – roughly the area of two parking spaces – and features a 12 sq metre WC with a water facility and a 12 sq metre balcony. “He could be permitted to have a television and also a small fridge in his cell as long as they were donated by his family,” information indicated.
Political Comments
The lawmaker denounced the speculated proposal to send the one-time head of state to Papuda as “a form of payback” on the part of the presiding magistrate who led Bolsonaro’s legal case and will decide his fate in the {