Crime wave: Three San Quentin escapees kill a cop in a gas-station holdup. Wounded, one of the escapees flees through black-shadowed streets to the handiest refuge: with former cellmate Steve Lacey. Steve is paroled, with a new life and lovely wife, and can't afford to be caught associating with old cronies. But homicide detective Sims wants to use Steve to help him catch the other 2 escapees, who in turn extort his help in a bank job.

Decoy: Gangster Frank Olins is about to die in the gas chamber much to the dismay of his girlfriend Margot Shelby. Only Frank knows the location of $400,000. Margot seduces gangster Jim Vincent to get him to engineer the removal of Olins' body from the prison immediately after he dies. She forces the prison doctor to administer an antidote for cyanide gas poisoning to Olins. The revived Olins gives Margot half of a map showing the money location and Vincent, in a fit of jealousy, kills Olins and takes the other half. Because the doctor's plates on his car will get them through the police roadblocks, Vincent and Margot take him with them on the money hunt.