In Mississippi, 10-year-old Tonya Hailey is viciously brutalized by two white
racists -- James Louis "Pete" Willard and Billy Ray Cobb. Almost immediately after Tonya is found and rushed to a hospital, Pete and Billy Ray are found at a roadside bar, where they had been bragging about what they did to Tonya.
While deputy Dwayne Powell Looney is escorting Pete and Billy Ray down a flight of stairs leaving a court room, Carl Lee Hailey emerges from a nearby closet with an assault rifle, and he kills Pete and Billy Ray for what they did to Tonya. Carl Lee is later arrested at his house by African-American
sheriff Ozzie Walls, and Carl Lee is scheduled to be placed on trial. And now its up to Jake Tyler Brigance, a young white lawyer, to save Carl Lee from death row.