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He battled the legal system and the legal system won.

Two months following receiving a quarter-century plus sentence for seeking to “destroy” Brazil’s democracy, ex-president Jair Bolsonaro finally looks headed to prison.

Imminent Jailing

The convicted coup-monger – who's been living under home confinement in his mansion while a set of judicial steps and appeals play out – is widely expected to be imprisoned in the next few days, during increasing talk that he will be moved to a well-known high-security penitentiary.

Historical Comments on Inmates

During Bolsonaro’s four-decade political career, the conservative former military man exhibited scant mercy for Brazil’s prison population.

“For what reason must we provide those scoundrels a good life?” he once mused. “They deserve to be messed, end of story. That's my opinion.”

At another time, Bolsonaro proclaimed: “Unless you desire to wind up there, the only thing required is not sexual assault, kidnap or rob.”

Jail Destination Discussion

Yet the idea of Bolsonaro himself winding up in the Papuda prison maximum security prison in Brasília has shocked allies, four of whom this week visited the prison in an obvious effort to discourage the high court from transferring him there.

Senator Lucas, a lawmaker from Bolsonaro’s allied group who was one of the visitors, said he expected the elderly leader to be jailed in the following week and a half and was concerned his assigned prison could be Papuda.

He asserted Bolsonaro’s severe gut issues – the result of a life-threatening knife attack during the 2018 presidential election race – meant it would be dangerous to keep the former president there. “His health is extremely serious. He cannot to manage if they send him to Papuda … It could be awful,” said the senator, who also worried about cramped cells and the standard of jail cuisine.

During his tour Papuda, Lucas remembered witnessing cells accommodating four dozen inmates: “That’s practically one meter squared per detainee.

“We spoke to the inmates and they protest, naturally, of the horrible food,” added the senator.

Allies Voice Concerns

He is not the sole person expressing views prior to the former president’s predicted incarceration.

Writing in a prominent daily, another ally, the ex- communications minister Fábio Wajngarten, bemoaned the “severe” conclusion to Bolsonaro’s “flawless” political career and claimed Brazil was about to witness “the biggest unfairness in its history”.

“It is an wrong that gnaws the spirits of millions Brazilian citizens,” Wajngarten wrote.

Mixed General Opinion

It is possibly true considering the substantial support Bolsonaro retains on the right-wing. But his anticipated incarceration has also gladdened the feelings of millions others who think he deserves to be imprisoned for conspiring to prevent the elected leader from becoming president – and even scheming to have him killed.

The lawmaker, a politician for the sitting leader's allied group, commented: “No one wants Bolsonaro to be placed in a dungeon. Nobody wants Bolsonaro to be sent in solitary confinement. Nobody desires Bolsonaro to lack food or for him to have to rest on hard ground. We wish him to get respectful handling – but respectful handling behind bars. He cannot continue being his self-appointed guard for his entire life.”

The congressman noted how Bolsonaro allies, who have long applauding the severe handling of convicts, had abruptly woken up to their privileges. “Recently has the conservative fringe – which has consistently claimed that human rights are not for offenders – chosen to inspect a prison to discover what situations are truly like,” he said.

“The former president is a criminal,” he affirmed, but that did not mean he deserved “humiliating, insulting conduct”.

Possible Jail Environment

Despite speculation that Bolsonaro could be transferred to Papuda, which now holds about thousands of prisoners, his more likely destination seems to be a adjacent prison for police officers and other “unique” inmates called Papudinha (Little Papuda).

Its cells are much more pleasant than those in the main prison, although nevertheless a distant from the opulence Bolsonaro enjoyed while occupying the impressive leader's home, about 12 miles away.

According to sources, the cell Bolsonaro could anticipate occupy in Papudinha is about 260 square feet – about the size of a couple of car spots – and features a 12 square meter WC with a bathing area and a 12 sq metre terrace. “He could be permitted to have a TV and additionally a minibar in his quarters as long as they were donated by his family,” the report suggested.

Ideological Responses

Senator Lucas criticized the rumoured plan to send the former leader to Papuda as “a type of payback” on the part of the judicial authority who oversaw Bolsonaro’s legal case and will rule on his outcome in the {