BRASILIA – A Brazil Supreme Court judge rejected former president Fernando Collor de Mello’s appeal on Thursday, reimposing his nearly nine-year prison sentence on corruption and money laundering charges.
Collor de Mello, Brazil’s first democratically elected president, was forced to resign halfway through his term in 1992 after congress launched impeachment proceedings against him for allegedly taking bribes. He was later elected senator.
“Alexandre de Moraes, of the Federal Supreme Court (STF), rejected the second appeal of the defense and determined the immediate arrest of the former president of the Republic and former senator Fernando Collor de Mello,” the court said in a statement.
The decision is “immediately” enforceable but will be put to a vote by the full Supreme Court on Friday.
In 2023, the 75-year-old former president was sentenced to eight years and 10 months for receiving 20 million reais ($3.5 million at the current exchange rate) in bribes between 2010 and 2014 when he was a senator.
The prosecution said the funds were received to “irregularly facilitate contracts” between a construction company and a former subsidiary of the Brazilian state oil company Petrobras.
Collor de Mello’s defense team received Thursday’s appeal decision “with surprise and concern”, according to a press statement. It added that he “will appear to comply with the decision.”
Collor de Mello is not Brazil’s first president of Brazil to run afoul of the law.
Four of the seven presidents who have led the country since the 1964-1985 military dictatorship have either been convicted, jailed or impeached.
In the latest case, far-right former president Jair Bolsonaro has been ordered to stand trial over an alleged coup plot after losing the 2022 election.