Rocky Mulloy, Dick Powell, is wrongly imprisoned for a robbery and murder he didn’t commit, and he spends years behind bars before a surprising twist of fate frees him. Five years into his sentence, an alleged eyewitness—a one‑legged ex‑Marine named Delong, Richard Erdman—appears with a counterfeit alibi that slowly reveals itself as a calculated ploy. Delong is an opportunist who realizes that by helping Rocky regain his freedom, he can claim a cut of the missing $100,000 from the original robbery. Rocky, stubborn and principled, maintains his innocence and sets out to uncover who set him up, hoping to also free his friend Danny Morgan, who remains jailed for the same crime. Upon arriving in Los Angeles, Police Lieutenant Gus Cobb, Regis Toomey, makes it clear that Rocky will be under constant surveillance as he navigates a city full of potential informants and hidden motives.
Rocky and Delong settle into a trailer park, a gritty backdrop for the precarious alliance they’ve formed. Morgan’s wife Nancy, Rhonda Fleming, a onetime girlfriend of Rocky’s, continues to live there, complicating the emotional landscape of his quest. Delong later meets Darlene, Jean Porter, a pretty resident who becomes entangled in the dangerous schemes surrounding the vanished money. The threads of deceit tighten as Rocky zeroes in on Louis Castro, the bookie who he believes masterminded the frame‑up. He confronts Castro with a demand for $50,000, arguing that Castro owes him for every year spent behind bars. Castro instead attempts to buy Rocky off with a mere $500 to place a bet on a longshot horse in a fixed race, a tempting but hollow offer that confirms to Rocky that Castro is deeply involved.
The search for a witness who testified at the trial leads Rocky to Mrs. Fletcher, Joan Banks, who reveals that her husband died two years earlier and, crucially, that after testifying he inherited $5,000. This new detail adds another layer to the web of motive and leverage surrounding the case. Rocky then goes to collect the winnings from the horse race, only to have Cobb tell him the money is tainted by payroll robbers and seize it, reinforcing the sense that Castro is working against him again. Castro’s contradictions become evident when Cobb presses him to verify the story; Castro stumbles, and Cobb senses the deception, having tailed Rocky to Castro’s office the previous night.
In a tense sequence, two men mistake Delong and his girlfriend Darlene for Rocky and Nancy, leaving Delong injured and Darlene dead in the chaos. Rocky responds with a brutal display of leverage, forcing Castro to play Russian roulette with the gun aimed at Castro’s head until the bookie finally spills a crucial truth: half of the robbery money is hidden in a safe under Castro’s desk. Castro also claims that Rocky’s friend Morgan participated in the crime and that Nancy knows the full truth and possesses her husband’s share. Rocky orders Castro to call Cobb and confess, but Castro instead signals his henchmen—the same ones who killed Darlene—creating a deadly pivot in the investigation. Rocky, however, is not fooled and makes a direct call to Cobb, drawing the killers into a police trap.
The story moves toward its final act as Rocky confronts Nancy, who admits she has the money and urges him to run away with her and the loot. Rocky pretends to consider the offer, all the while keeping a careful watch for the truth. When he spots Cobb waiting outside Nancy’s trailer, he reveals the location of the hidden money and chooses to walk away, leaving behind a life-altering decision and a tangle of loyalties that will haunt him beyond this case.
