Bolsonaro files an appeal to overturn his conviction after the court’s final ruling

Former President Jair Bolsonaro presented a new appeal to the Supreme Court of Brazil this Friday with the aim of annulling the 27-year sentence that was imposed on him for leading a plot to overthrow the current president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, despite the fact that the court has already ended the process.

The far-right leader’s lawyers want the case to be reviewed by a larger panel and for the vote of magistrate Luiz Fux to be upheld, the only one who ruled for the nullity of the criminal action and the acquittal of the former head of State (2019-2022).

You may be interested in: Jair Bolsonaro’s disapproval rate reaches 51%, according to a poll

Bolsonaro was convicted by four of the five magistrates of the First Chamber of the Supreme Federal Court and since Tuesday is serving the sentence under a closed regime at the headquarters of the Federal Police in Brasilia, by decision of Judge Alexandre de Moraes, the case’s instructor, who declared the conviction final and ended the process on November 25th. The defense of the former Army captain denounces in the new appeal a “judicial error” for having anticipated the final sentence while the deadline for presenting new seizures was still running, which, it considers, should be reviewed. “With all due respect, it is not appropriate to call a recourse dilatory when it has not even been filed. Moreover, without knowing its reasons, it is surprising that it was called dilatory,” the defense declared. This refers to so-called infringing embargoes, an exceptional recourse, admitted only in cases of divided decisions. According to the jurisprudence of the Brazilian Court, this type of appeals are only valid when there are at least two votes for acquittal, a condition that was not met in the case of Bolsonaro, since only Fux voted in that direction. Even so, the defense maintains that the Supreme Court’s internal regulations allow for the review of any divided ruling and accuses the First Chamber of violating the Supreme Court’s own internal rules by preventing an appeal that the court’s law says is automatic when there is no unanimity. “The STF’s own Internal Regulations, in its article 333, item I, establishes that it is possible to file infringing attachments against a non-unanimous decision of the Court, without any additional condition,” the lawyers point out. Bolsonaro was sentenced to 27 years and three months in prison after being found guilty of a conspiracy that attempted to prevent the inauguration of the current president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who defeated him in the October 2022 elections, when he was seeking re-election. The former president was under house arrest for failing to comply with various precautionary measures imposed as part of the process, and last Saturday he had been transferred to Federal Police facilities in Brasilia, after attempting to damage an electronic ankle bracelet that was part of those restrictions. Since Tuesday, when the Supreme Court upheld the sentence, the far-rightist is serving his sentence in the same Federal Police room where he was already held.