Former President Jair Bolsonaro said he tampered with his ankle monitor after a medication change caused a nervous breakdown and hallucinations.

Police took Brazil’s convicted former president Jair Bolsonaro into custody early on Saturday after a supreme court judge said he was planning to escape from house arrest, days before the rightwinger was expected to start serving a 27-year jail sentence.

Bolsonaro was arrested after he broke his ankle monitor. This happened right after his son, Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, called for a vigil outside the former president’s house. The supreme court justice, Alexandre de Moraes, said Bolsonaro’s escape would have been “facilitated by the confusion caused by the demonstration called by his son”.

Brazil's federal police on Saturday took former President Jair Bolsonaro into custody due to flight risk after he took a soldering iron to his ankle monitor, ending months of house arrest as he appeals his conviction for plotting a coup.

Brazil’s former President Jair Bolsonaro was arrested Saturday and deemed a flight risk for an alleged attempt to avoid his 27-year prison sentence related to his efforts to stay in power in

Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro was detained in Brasilia because of a possible "attempted escape" to an embassy before he was to begin his prison sentence.

On his first full day in jail, former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro told a judge on Sunday he had violated his ankle monitoring the day before at his house arrest because of a nervous breakdown and hallucinations caused by a change in his medication.