Fernando Collor Falls from Power to Prison

April 28th, 2025

Dhruv Arun

Brazil’s former President Fernando Collor de Mello has been arrested after a Supreme Court justice rejected his challenges against a previous conviction and ordered him to start serving jail time. Collor’s lawyer, Marcelo Bessa, said the former leader was arrested at 4am (07:00 GMT) on Friday while travelling to Brazil’s capital Brasilia, where he planned to turn himself in after Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes’ arrest order. The 75-year-old politician was being held by federal police in the northeastern city of Maceio, the capital of Alagoas state, Bessa said in a statement.

A federal police source also told AFP that the 75-year-old was arrested in the northeast of the country. Moraes’ order on Thursday came after the top court sentenced Collor, the first president to win the popular vote after the end of Brazil’s last military dictatorship in 1985, to eight years and 10 months in prison in 2023 on corruption and money-laundering charges. Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered the former president’s arrest Thursday, with the full board set to vote on Friday whether to confirm the decision. The 2023 conviction came after Brazilian prosecutors accused Collor of receiving about 30 million reais ($5.28 million) in bribes from a then subsidiary of state-run oil company Petrobras. Prosecutors allege the funds were received to "irregularly facilitate contracts" between a construction company and a former subsidiary of the Brazilian state oil company Petrobras.

Additionally, Collor was convicted of receiving 20 million reais ($3.5 million) to facilitate contracts between BR Distribuidora, a fuel distributor formerly controlled by the state-owned oil company Petrobras, and construction firm UTC Engenharia for the construction of fuel distribution bases. In return, he offered political support for the appointment of executives at BR Distribuidora when it was still state-owned. Collor’s lawyer had already voiced “surprise and concern” at Moraes’ decision in an initial statement released late on Thursday, but added that the former president would comply with the order. De Moraes said in his decision that Collor should begin serving his sentence, noting that the former president’s lawyers have attempted to drag out proceedings through appeals.

Collor took office as president in 1990, but did not finish his term as Congress decided to impeach him two years later amid a separate corruption scandal for which the Supreme Court acquitted him in 1994. He was Brazil's first democratically elected president, although he didn't finish serving his term after accusations of corruption. He was impeached and removed from office by Congress in 1992 following corruption allegations. After leaving the presidency, he was later elected as a senator representing the state of Alagoas. He eventually left Congress in early 2023 following an unsuccessful bid for governor of Alagoas.

The case stemmed from Operation Car Wash, a sweeping corruption investigation that has implicated top politicians and businesspeople across Latin America. This included the current president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who was arrested in 2018 and imprisoned for nearly two years. Collor de Mello is not Brazil’s first president 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.