Bolsonaro has been taken into custody after authorities concluded he posed a concrete flight risk while under domestic detention.
The one-time leader was convicted of planning a military coup in the ninth month and sentenced more than 27 years in jail, but he continued under house arrest pending legal challenges.
Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Justice Moraes said the move to detain the elderly politician was a precautionary step after "new facts" emerged.
This encompassed attempting to break his ankle monitor and a invitation to a public vigil that could facilitate a potential flight.
Court Filing Details Escape Risks
In a filing authorising the detention, Justice Moraes said information from the unit overseeing the former president's confinement suggested the one-time head of state's plan to remove the tracking monitor to guarantee victory in his getaway".
This, it said, would be made easier by the confusion caused by the demonstration called by his offspring.
His offspring, Flávio Bolsonaro, who works as a legislator, called for a assembly of his backers near his father's house to take place on Saturday night.
The senator wrote on online platforms on Friday: Will you battle for your country, or watch it all from your mobile device there on your couch? I invite you to struggle with us."
He said the demonstration would be so supporters could "pray for his physical condition and for the return of democracy in our country."
Diplomatic Refuge Fears
Part of the judge's determination was the potential of Bolsonaro's "relocation to diplomatic missions near the home, considering that the investigations revealed a record of planning to request asylum through a diplomatic representation", a declaration said.
The legal document highlights that the US embassy in the capital, the capital city, is located around 8 miles from the former president's residence.
Worldwide Consequences
Bolsonaro's legal woes have provoked anger from fellow right-wing populist American leader Donald Trump, leading him to enact a fifty percent tax on Brazilian product imports.
The former president is being detained in a national police facility in Brasilia and will have a detention review on Sunday.
Recent Legal Requests
It was only on Friday that the former president's lawyers asked the Supreme Court to allow him to serve his whole jail sentence under house arrest, with tracking devices.
They also petitioned that the former president be permitted to leave his home for medical care, saying he demanded frequent medical attention for lung conditions and other illnesses.
Context of Sentencing
The former president was determined responsible of orchestrating a scheme aimed at keeping him in power after he lost the 2022 election to his left-wing rival, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Top judicial officials said that he knew of a plot which encompassed plans to murder the current president and his VP candidate, Alckmin, and to detain and kill the presiding judge - the Supreme Court justice who has been presiding over Bolsonaro's trial.
The scheme was stopped because it couldn't obtain the endorsement of the armed forces officials. The current president was inaugurated without problem on January 1st, 2023.
But a following week, on January 8th, many Bolsonaro supporters stormed and vandalised public facilities in the federal district, Brasília.
The security forces took action and around 1,500 people were detained.
The magistrates found that the demonstrators had been provoked by him whose strategy, they said, was for the Brazilian military to step in, reestablish control and bring him back to power.
At the period, his attorneys called the decades-long sentence unreasonably severe".
He was also banned from running for public office until twenty-sixty - eight years later after the completion of his term.
The former president called the legal proceedings a targeted investigation" and said it was designed to prevent him competing in the 2026 national vote.
