Wash. Supreme Court published opinion — 893900.pdf

Citation: Wash. Supreme Court published opinion — 893900.pdf
Jurisdiction: Washington (state)
Source verification: official_capture_completeness_unverified
Original Source: https://www.courts.wa.gov/opinions/pdf/893900.pdf ↗

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substantially different from that in Brooks, quoted above. Compare Briggs, 666

N.W.2d at 578-80, with Brooks, 604 N.W.2d at 349-50. Briggs suggests that

"sufficient sureties" means a "defendant was given the right to be bailed, subject to

the state's analysis of a surety's sufficiency to provide adequate recompense if the

-13-
 Statev. Barton
 (Peter
   
Richard), 89390-0     

prisoner did not show for his judicial proceedings." 666 N.W.2d at 582. As

explained above, this is a dubious proposition.

Perhaps more problematically for the State, the Briggs court "[u]ltimately"

believed that "the core purpose of the clause was to guarantee a bailable individual

access to a surety of some form." Id. at 581. It concluded that a cash-only bail "is

permissible under the sufficient sureties clause of the Iowa Constitution so long as

the accused is permitted access to a surety in some form." Id. at 583. Thus, the

Briggs court seemed to recognize that cash and surety are separate options. The

court explained that the defendant had

presented no evidence to show she was absolutely precluded from accessing
a surety of some form. Instead, her allegations appear to center on the denial
of access to a commercial bail bond .... [T]here is no absolute right to such
access. Briggs has made no claim that she could not otherwise find a
sufficient surety. Under other circumstances, we would, perhaps, remand
this issue to the district court to determine whether Briggs' access to a surety
was completely precluded.

Id. at 584. In the end, the Briggs court was equivocal about what the constitutional

provision actually required. To the extent it suggested a surety option is required,

we agree.