Bolsonaro authorised to reduce 27-year sentence by reading books

Jair Bolsonaro’s lawyers have invoked a provision of Brazilian law that allows inmates to reduce their sentences by reading books, and a supreme court judge authorised the former president to take part in the scheme. Bolsonaro was sentenced to 27 years last year and this week was transferred to a maximum security prison in the capital, Brasília, after spending Christmas imprisoned at a federal police base.

Under the law, prisoners can cut their sentences by four days for each title read and must prove they have read the books by submitting written reports to prison authorities. The approved reading list for Bolsonaro includes Brazilian works on Indigenous rights, racism, the environment and the violence meted out by the country’s 1964–85 dictatorship.

Titles on the list range from Ana Maria Gonçalves’s 950‑page Um Defeito de Cor to the children’s non‑fiction picture book Democracy! by Philip Bunting, and also include very long classics such as Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace and Miguel de Cervantes’s Don Quixote.

Key Topics

Politics, Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil, Brasília, Brazilian Law, A Colour Defect