When white cab driver Mike Cystak is found murdered in the Bottoms and the $1500 in cash he had with him missing, there is fear that racial tensions in Sparta could reach a breaking point. Officer Parker Williams arrives on the scene of the murder and catches a black man named William Jackson next to the victim with blood on his hand and sleeve, and he has around the same amount of money in his wallet that is missing from the dead cabbie. Chief Gillespie and Detective Tibbs clash over whether Jackson is the prime suspect in Cystak's death.