
Carroll O'Connor stars as a small-town police chief (and later a sheriff) in fictional Sparta, Miss. For a small town, Sparta has its share of murder, rape, corruption, racism and drunken driving, so O'Connor's Chief William Gillespie has his hands full. The TV series is based on the novel and film of the same name.

A psychiatrist protects a patient who confessed to a murder for which an innocent man stands to be executed.

Virgil's arrest of a young drug pusher has serious side effects for the youth's family, particularly his brother, and for Althea.

Bubba and an insurance investigator (Debra Sandlund) search Los Angeles for a bail jumper from Sparta.

Lonnie Jamison and Virgil show a despondent Eugene DeLong, whose father is facing the death penalty for murder, that life continues.