Bolsonaro files new Supreme Court appeal to annul 27-year coup sentence
Defense lawyers for Brazil's former president seek to suspend his conviction, citing digital evidence flaws and invoking a recent Supreme Court precedent.
Lawyers for former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro filed a new criminal review (revisão criminal) with the Supreme Court on October 1, 2026, seeking to suspend and ultimately annul his 27-year and 3-month prison sentence. The conviction stems from his role in an alleged coup attempt to overturn the results of the 2022 presidential election. The defense's 80-page petition has been assigned to Supreme Court Justice Kassio Nunes Marques, a Bolsonaro appointee who is already analyzing a previous appeal by the former president.
The legal battle over Bolsonaro’s freedom directly shapes the political landscape and electoral calculations of Brazil's conservative opposition. While Bolsonaro remains ineligible to run for office and has been serving his sentence under house arrest in Brasília since late 2025, his political movement remains highly influential. The trajectory of his appeals directly impacts the political risk premium in Brazil and the electoral strength of the conservative opposition, currently led by his son, Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, as they prepare for future national campaigns.
In the new filing, Bolsonaro's legal team, led by attorney Celso Vilardi, argues that there was a critical breach of custody in the digital evidence used to convict the former president. The defense presented a new technical report alleging that the digital files were not properly tracked or preserved, which they argue compromises the integrity and origin of the data. They also claim that the defense team faced "unbelievable violations" of due process, including restricted and progressive access to the evidence, which prevented a full analysis before trial proceedings began.
To bolster their case, the defense cited a recent procedural precedent set by the Supreme Court itself during debates in the Banco Master case. In that case, Justice Alexandre de Moraes—who has been the driving force behind the investigations into Bolsonaro—acknowledged that defense teams must be given adequate time and access to analyze complex, voluminous digital files. Bolsonaro’s lawyers argue that the same standard of procedural guarantees must be applied to the former president's case, asserting that the refusal to delay trial proceedings to allow for a proper evidence review violated his constitutional rights.
The petition is now in the hands of Justice Kassio Nunes Marques, who must decide whether to grant an injunction to suspend the execution of Bolsonaro's sentence while the full court reviews the merits of the appeal. Because Nunes Marques was appointed to the bench by Bolsonaro in 2020 and has maintained a historically sympathetic stance toward the former leader, his upcoming decision is being closely watched by both allies and adversaries across Brazil's political spectrum.