Mystery-thriller set in the Florida Everglades adapted from the novel by John Katzenbach. Tanny Brown, played by Fishburne, is a policeman who secured the confession that put Bobby Earl Fergussen (Blair Underwood), a black man accused of murdering a white girl, on death row. Law professor Paul Armstrong (Sean Connery) comes on the scene and discovers that Fergussen may be innocent and Brown may be a very bad cop.