An aging lawman in 1901 Oklahoma employs the latest crime detection techniques to solve the murder of a homesteading couple while overcoming the skepticism of his young, college-educated police chief.
Legendary outlaw Wes Durham is being held in the New Prospect jail, awaiting a new form of execution: electric chair. Hec's job is to uncover and capture an admirer of the outlaw, who is killing a person each day until Durham is set free.
Hec sets out to uncover the killers of a family of settlers. Their arrow-pierced bodies and a brave's medicine sack containing a green feather implicate the Indians, but Hec is reluctant to rush to judgment.
Hec pursues a check forger to Santa Rita, New Mexico, where he meets and rekindles an old flame. Hec plays attorney to free a friend being framed for murder, which puts him afoul of Henry T. Madden, a tyrant who holds the town in fear.
