Bernie Ecclestone Arrested in Portugal for Shotgun on Private Jet

Bernie Ecclestone, the former Formula 1 supremo who once ruled the paddock with an iron grip, has reportedly been arrested in Portugal for carrying a shotgun on his private jet – the second time in four years he has been detained over a firearm.

The 95-year-old Briton was stopped at Tires Aerodrome in Cascais, just outside Lisbon, after landing his private aircraft, according to Portuguese outlet Correio de Manha. Airport officers are said to have discovered the shotgun during what has been described locally as a routine operation.

Ecclestone was held at the aerodrome while the authorities dealt with the incident. Portugal’s Airport Division of the Public Security Police (PSP) has not yet issued an official statement on the case, and the precise legal consequences remain unclear.

The PSP moved quickly to distance its border control unit from the arrest. A spokesman said their officers had not carried out the detention being attributed to them, pointing instead to the Tax and Customs Authority – Lisbon Delegation (Customs) as the body responsible for the occurrence. Customs officials have so far been unavailable for comment.

For Ecclestone, the scene will have felt uncomfortably familiar.

In 2022, he was detained at Campinas airport near Sao Paulo after a gun was found in his luggage as he prepared to board a private jet to Switzerland. He later admitted carrying the LW Seecamp .32 pistol, saying he had not realised it was still in his bag. Brazilian authorities confirmed that a businessman had been arrested for possession of a firearm, though they did not name him at the time.

Ecclestone paid bail, was freed, and allowed to continue his journey to Switzerland. He would later brush off the episode as a “silly, tiny little incident”, while acknowledging the aggravation it caused as he tried to travel back to Europe with his family. He also insisted he had not been “formally arrested”, despite the official confirmation from Brazil’s public security forces.

The former F1 boss has previously said he bought the small handgun years earlier in Brazil from a Formula One mechanic, without ammunition, and claimed he kept it as a deterrent.

“They said you need something like this,” he recalled of the advice he was given at the time. “It might work if someone tried to mug you or something. So I bought it from the guy.” He described having the weapon at home and joking around with visitors.

This latest incident, involving a shotgun rather than a pistol, raises fresh questions over his relationship with firearms and how they have twice surfaced at airports as he prepared to fly privately. It is not yet known whether he will be charged in Portugal or brought before a judge.

Ecclestone, who reshaped Formula 1 into a global commercial powerhouse and controlled the sport for decades, now divides his time between Switzerland and Portugal, with homes in both countries as well as in Brazil. His ties to Portugal run deep: he played a key role in bringing F1 back to the country in 1984, helping to re-establish it on the calendar.

His legal problems have not been confined to weapons.

In 2022, Ecclestone agreed to pay £652 million after failing to declare overseas assets, including a trust in Singapore holding a bank account with around £400 million. He pleaded guilty to a single charge of fraud and received a 17-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, avoiding immediate jail time.

Now, with another firearm case hanging over him, the man who once dictated the fate of grands prix and circuits worldwide finds his own movements under scrutiny at a modest aerodrome outside Lisbon.