Robert Pugh and Nathaniel Henderson v. James Rainwater

SIMPSON, Circuit Judge:

Since Florida’s admission to the Union persons charged in the courts of that state with bailable offenses were entitled to obtain pretrial freedom by paying or having a surety pay to the court a sum of money refundable upon appearance at trial. Plaintiffs in the instant case, indigent pretrial detainees 1 suing on behalf of themselves and others similarly situated, maintain that this traditional practice denies them equal protection of the law by conditioning their right to pretrial freedom on wealth-based criteria. We agree and hold that equal protection is not…