Brasília, Brazil - Brazil's former president Jair Bolsonaro, on trial over a botched coup bid and under house arrest since August, was taken into custody on Saturday, according to his lawyer and a court document.

The far-right politician was sentenced in September to 27 years in prison over a plot to stop leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva from taking office in 2022 following Bolsonaro's election defeat.

The Supreme Court judge leading the trial against Bolsonaro, Alexandre de Moraes, concluded Bolsonaro was a "high flight risk" and ordered pre-trial detention, according to the ruling seen by AFP.

The ruling says Bolsonaro planned to break his ankle monitor during a rally scheduled for later on Saturday, called by his son outside the politician's home in Brasilia.

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Sources close to the case earlier said the former leader had been taken into custody as a precaution and not to begin serving his sentence.

Celso Vilardi, one of Bolsonaro's lawyers, told AFP that "he has been imprisoned, but I don't know why."

A police statement that did not mention the former president by name said officers had "executed a preventive arrest request in compliance with a Supreme Court decision."

Bolsonaro, who governed Brazil from 2019 to 2022, was placed under house arrest in August for violating measures imposed on him. He has been confined to an upscale condominium in the capital Brasilia, and monitored electronically.

An appeal of his sentence was rejected last week, bringing him one step closer to serving his prison term.

Bolsonaro's lawyers have said they would file further appeals before a Monday deadline, but sought to get ahead of plans to put Bolsonaro in jail by requesting he be allowed to serve his sentence under house arrest.

They had previously argued that Bolsonaro's medical needs were "absolutely incompatible with a common prison environment."

Bolsonaro was convicted in September of leading a criminal organization that conspired to ensure his "authoritarian hold on power."

The plot involved a plan to assassinate Lula, his vice president Geraldo Alckmin, and the Supreme Court judge de Moraes.

Sending Bolsonaro to prison "will have serious consequences and represents a risk to his life," his lawyers said in a petition to the Supreme Court.

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They added Bolsonaro's "health condition is already deeply debilitated."

Bolsonaro (70) suffers ongoing consequences of a stab wound to the abdomen received during a knife attack on the campaign trail in 2018.

His lawyers said that since he was placed under house arrest, Bolsonaro "has already been hospitalized three times – twice for tests and once due to a medical emergency."

They added he required continuous treatment for pulmonary infections, esophagitis, and gastritis, and has skin cancer and suffered from sleep apnea that required him to sleep with a CPAP machine.

In September, Bolsonaro's doctor said his skin cancer lesions had been removed and that he required no further treatment at that stage.

He also suffered from persistent "uncontrollable hiccups" which require daily medication and have caused shortness of breath and fainting, according to the petition.

It highlighted the fact that in May, another former president, Fernando Collor de Mello, was allowed to serve his nearly nine-year sentence for corruption at home, on health grounds.