In the criminal justice system, the principle of equality has been actualized as a distribution policy of procedural rights. All humans have an equal basic moral status. However, the equality of chances in a criminal process cannot be realised only through a normative equality of treatment. The Italian criminal process (like other criminal justice systems in western countries) allows some differences in treatment with regard to the status or the social conditions of the accused persons, to the severity of the offences as well as to some efficiency requirements of the penal system. Of great importance are social, economic and linguistic inequalities. The law must take them into account to ensure that the abstract guarantees can, in fact, be exercised by disadvantaged citizens as well. This contribution examines, with a critical perspective, the main problems encountered in the Italian experience with regard to the implementation of the equality principle in criminal proceedings.