Brazil's former president Jair Bolsonaro has told a custody hearing that he used a soldering iron on his electronic ankle monitor after suffering a substance-induced 'psychotic attack' that made him believe the device was bugged. The 70-year-old made the claim on Sunday, a day after his arrest at his home in Brasília on suspicion of planning to flee to a foreign embassy to avoid a 27-year prison sentence for orchestrating a failed coup.
Bolsonaro, who has been under house arrest since August, was found guilty by the Supreme Court in September of engineering a coup attempt. He had been expected to be sent to prison imminently after a series of appeals. However, security officials detected tampering with his ankle tag just after midnight on Friday, and a Supreme Court judge ordered his arrest early Saturday, suspecting he was preparing to seek refuge in a foreign embassy. In 2024, Bolsonaro spent two nights at the Hungarian embassy for unexplained reasons.
At the hearing, Bolsonaro claimed he could not recall having such a psychotic episode before and attributed the paranoia to two medications he began taking days earlier: a powerful analgesic and an antidepressant. He said he became convinced the tag contained a covert listening device. After damaging the equipment, he said he eventually 'snapped out of it'. In earlier video footage, however, Bolsonaro was heard telling a security official that he interfered with the device 'out of curiosity'.
Political observers and opponents expressed scepticism about his explanation. Bolsonaro had previously relied on support from US President Donald Trump, who imposed 50% tariffs on Brazilian goods and sanctioned senior officials, calling the coup trial a 'witch-hunt'. But Trump's backing waned after meeting Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva at the UN in September, and he rolled back tariffs on beef and coffee last Thursday.
When informed of Bolsonaro's arrest on Saturday, Trump gave a lukewarm response, saying 'That's too bad'. US Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau criticised the 'provocative and unnecessary incarceration', but no severe retaliation from Washington was immediately evident.
