Ex-boxer Jimmy Kerrigan (Alex Ferns) is released from a Northern Irish prison after serving a nine-year sentence for arms trafficking and returns to the Glasgow council estate he grew up on where he immediately find his heroin addict younger brother, Terry (Cas Harkins), being attacked by two thugs for dealing drugs on a rival gang's turf. He elects to take Terry's punishment for him and is badly beaten by the hoodlums. Word of Jimmy's release soon reaches Donnie McGlone (James Cosmo), the crime lord he once served, and he is taken to McGlone's home by two henchman for a meeting with his former boss who tries to bring him back into his crew.
Phillip Bellamy, a leading barrister, tells his wife, psychiatrist Anne Dyson, about his most recent case defending a young man, Harry Jukes, who has apparently shot a policeman on a country road and been found by police still holding the gun. Bellamy is convinced of his guilt but Anne is less sure. Much of her practice is with troubled young people, and she feels there is more to the story than the police evidence.
After witnessing nightclub owner Tony Pearl murdered by gangster Mike Scarlotti (John Bradford), blues singer Eleanor Spenser (Irene Manning) flees Chicago and heads West on a bus. Soon her picture appears in newspapers across the country. The bus makes a stop in Turquoise City, New Mexico, where Martin Simms (Cornelius Keefe), the crooked owner of the Blue Moon saloon, befriends Eleanor.
With the assistance of a journalist a group of refugees and down and outs try and unmask the criminal who has framed one of their number as a drug dealer.
When Dr. Pablo Gonzuelo, President of Santanio, condemns the revolutionary Vorgler to death, a group of South American revolutionaries in London kidnap the President's daughter Rosa, along with American pilot Bill Trainer. When Vorgler is executed, the revolutionaries are ready to murder Rosa and Trainer, but they are rescued in time.
Russell is a convict who is bequeathed a set of seven keys by a fellow prisoner. After discovering that the deceased was an embezzler who stole £20,000 that was never recovered, on his release Russell sets out to find the cash. However, he must first solve the mystery of which locks the keys fit, and run the gauntlet of the police and a number of gangsters who are after him and the money.
An insurance investigator infiltrates a gang who has stolen jewels from the eponymous building on Maiden Lane in the Fulton Street District of Manhattan.
A consortium of American businesses are disturbed by the loss of profits due to Chinese businesses located in Chinatowns in the United States. They hire a pair of Eurasians and their criminal organization to eliminate their competition.
Steve Donegan is an elected district attorney and launches an anti-organized crime campaign. Joe Silenus, a crime boss, plots to frame Donegan for accepting a bribe. Donegan is sentenced to prison, where he re-encounters all the men he convicted during his anti-crime crusade.
Artist Trevor Stevenson (Meeker), an emotionally scarred World War II veteran, is on honeymoon in Acapulco with his bride Stella (Rule). Shortly after their arrival, two women are murdered. The audience is presented with clues pointing to Trevor's guilt or innocence depending upon one's point of view.
There have been a series of attacks on women walking home in the early hours, and now a woman has been found murdered. Chief Inspector Peter Lawton investigates. His suspicion falls on Edward King, an ex-commando who is engaged to Lawton's sister Joan.
After Jake's father is arrested and goes to jail, Jake inherits his drug business. Although Jake is reluctant to get involved, his friend and roommate Alfie ambitiously plans to expand their empire. While walking home after a drug deal, Jake finds Jade, a young girl, playing alone on a roof.
Private detective Humphrey Campbell tracks down a runaway woman named Louise and ends up marrying her. On the way to Reno, Nevada, for their honeymoon, the couple stops at a bank, which is robbed by three men. Humphrey's employer, Oscar Flack of the Flack Missing Persons Bureau, tracks the newlyweds to a Reno hotel.
Orville "Gabby" Denton is an alcoholic drifter with a chronic gambling problem. Despite his flaws he is beloved by his family. Gabby's brother-in-law Beef gets Gabby work as a mechanic at the Metropolitan Garage.
Bulldog Drummond and Algy Longworth are in the midst of preparations for Bulldog's wedding in London, to his fiancé, Phyllis. They are summoned to the house of Richard Gannett, an eccentric scientist, who has invented a prototype electric "death-ray" device which has the potential to revolutionize warfare. Upon arriving, they find Gannett, an apparent victim of murder, who says “Look out for The Stinger!” before dying.
Confidence trickster Roger Kingsley convinces the Los Angeles police that, acting as an insurance company's investigator, he can help them apprehend the notorious swindler Mary Webb. Kingsley sets a trap at a department store and nabs Webb as she steals an expensive fur coat. While the store detective is contacting police, Kingsley allows Webb, who is actually his girlfriend, to escape.
Unhappy with the modern day legal system, five men have decided to band together to hand out vigilante justice to anyone they think deserves it. This list is rather loose, as they include tailgaters along with drug dealers and other serious criminals. The band, which calls themselves "Razor Eaters" and videotapes all of their activities, has attracted the attention of Detective Danny Berdan (Paul Moder), who finds himself captivated by the gang's footage.
Professor Appleby has terrorised his wife, Eleanor, but when he is murdered, and her lover, Derek goes missing, Eleanor suspects the worst. A mysterious stranger, known as 'Mr Quinny' or 'Mr Quin' appears, and begins to seduce Eleanor, but his alcoholism takes over and he dies. Before dying, he reveals that he was Derek all along, and offers the girl to a rival, who promises to make Eleanor a happy wife.
Jill Kelso (Bess Armstrong) is a Des Moines, Iowa television news anchor, whose younger sister, an aspiring actress, has entered a life of prostitution in Los Angeles. When the sister becomes the eleventh victim of a sex murderer, Kelso conducts her own undercover investigation into Hollywood's night world of commercial sex. Along the way, chemistry develops with a sympathetic cop (Max Gail) who tries to save her from becoming a victim herself.