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He contested the law and the law won.

A couple of months subsequent to being handed a quarter-century plus sentence for trying to “annihilate” Brazil’s democratic institutions, ex-president Jair Bolsonaro finally looks jail-bound.

Imminent Imprisonment

The convicted coup-monger – who's been living under residential detention in his residence while a series of judicial steps and appeals play out – is widely expected to be jailed in the coming days, during increasing talk that he will be transferred to a notorious high-security penitentiary.

Historical Statements on Prisoners

Throughout Bolsonaro’s four-decade time in politics, the conservative former military man displayed little mercy for Brazil’s prison population.

“Why should we offer these scoundrels a good life?” he once pondered. “They ought to simply be screwed, end of story. That's my opinion.”

At another time, Bolsonaro stated: “Unless you desire to end up there, the only thing required is not rape, abduction or rob.”

Incarceration Location Speculation

However the idea of Bolsonaro himself ending up in the Papuda maximum security prison in Brasília has horrified supporters, a group of four this week toured the facility in an obvious bid to dissuade the supreme court from transferring him there.

Senator Lucas, a senator from Bolsonaro’s Liberal party who was among that group, stated he predicted the elderly politician to be imprisoned in the coming fortnight and feared his assigned prison could be Papuda.

The senator argued Bolsonaro’s acute gut problems – the consequence of a near-fatal assault during the 2018 political campaign – meant it would be risky to keep the ex-leader there. “His [health] situation is very grave. He won’t be able to cope if they move him to Papuda … It could be awful,” said the senator, who also worried about cramped cells and the quality of jail cuisine.

During his tour Papuda, Lucas remembered observing cells containing four dozen inmates: “That’s practically one meter squared per inmate.

“We spoke to the prisoners and they complain, of course, of the horrible food,” remarked the senator.

Supporters Speak Out

Lucas is not the lone figure speaking out ahead of the ex-leader's predicted detention.

Authoring in a major daily, a different supporter, the former communications minister Fábio Wajngarten, lamented the “severe” finale to Bolsonaro’s “spotless” time in office and asserted Brazil was about to see “the biggest political injustice in its past”.

“It is an injustice that gnaws the hearts of countless people in Brazil,” the former minister said.

Varied Popular Opinion

It is possibly true given the considerable backing Bolsonaro retains on the Brazilian right. But his expected incarceration has also gladdened the hearts of numerous others who think he deserves to be incarcerated for plotting to block the elected leader from becoming president – and even conspiring to have him assassinated.

Reimont Otoni, a politician for the incumbent president's allied group, commented: “Not a soul desires Bolsonaro to be sent in a hole. Nobody wants Bolsonaro to be put in segregation. Not a soul desires Bolsonaro to go hungry or for him to have to rest on hard ground. We wish him to receive respectful handling – but proper treatment while incarcerated. He can’t persist being his own prison warden for his lifetime.”

He observed how Bolsonaro supporters, who have spent years praising the tough conditions of inmates, had unexpectedly woken up to their privileges. “Only now has the extreme right – which has repeatedly claimed that human rights were not for offenders – decided to inspect a jail to discover what circumstances are really like,” he said.

“He is a offender,” the congressman maintained, but that did not mean he earned “humiliating, insulting treatment”.

Potential Prison Conditions

In spite of speculation that Bolsonaro could be transferred to Papuda, which now holds about 14,000 prisoners, his expected destination seems to be a nearby prison for law enforcement and other “particular” inmates referred to as Papudinha (Small Papuda).

The accommodations are far more comfortable than those in the larger jail, although still a distant from the comfort Bolsonaro enjoyed while living in the spectacular official residence, about 12 miles away.

According to sources, the room Bolsonaro could anticipate occupy in Papudinha is about 24 sq metres – approximately the size of a couple of car spots – and features a 130 square foot WC with a shower and a 130 square foot balcony. “He could be permitted to have a set and also a minibar in his cell as long as they were donated by his loved ones,” the report stated.

Political Responses

The lawmaker denounced the rumoured plan to send the ex-president to Papuda as “a form of payback” on the part of the presiding magistrate who oversaw Bolsonaro’s coup trial and will decide his fate in the {