Suspect

In Wahington D.C., a couple of days before Christmas, the Supreme Court Justice Lowell delivers an envelope to his secretary Elizabeth Quinn. When she leaves his office, he commits suicide with a rifle. Then a group of men swimming in the river finds Elizabeth's body floating in the water and the violent homeless Carl Wayne Anderson is arrested for the murder. The public defender Kathleen Riley is assigned by the court to represent Anderson. Soon she learns that her client is a deaf and dumb Vietnam veteran and that he was arrested because he slept in Elizabeth's unlocked car in the cold night when she was murdered. Riley approves the efficient lobbyist of the milk business Eddie Sanger to be a member of the jury. Judge Matthew Bishop Helms does not allow Riley to delay the judgment to look for a potential witness of the murder and supports prosecutor Charlie Stella most of the time. Sanger finds the investigation suspicious and decides to investigate the crime by his own, helping with Riley's investigation that does not accept his unethical behavior. Soon they learn that an important member of the Justice System fixed a case in 1998, and Anderson is the scapegoat for Elizabeth's murder who discovered the case. But who is the killer?