A hardened criminal, whose personality belies his viciousness, escapes from prison, killing a guard. Dan Mathews swings into action, and as the man commits one ruthless act after another to break through the trap closing in on him, it becomes apparent that there's almost a personal conflict between the two men - that ends only when they meet face to face in the final scene.
An expensive, giant computer, one of the twentieth century wonders, which does a tremendous amount of administrative work in just hours, is ingeniously 'kidnapped' from an electronics company by two men. The firm's owner is told to get $100,000 from his bank at two o'clock the next day and wait for instructions. A helicopter chase helps Dan stop the men from collecting the ransom or getting away.
Systematic traffic checks and increased patrols begin on a high accident freeway. Hoping to determine causes and cures, Dan questions drivers who get too many citations there. One man refuses to accept Dan's safety philosophy. When his license is suspended, his wife drives him to an important business meeting. En route, her eyeglasses break and he takes over at the wheel. Encountering a traffic check, he panics and flees, resulting in a severe accident in which his wife is critically injured. He learns the hard way - and too late - what Dan had earlier tried to impress upon him.
An uninvolved man happens to be in the company of two brothers who hold up a diner and kill its owner. Fearing the police and terrified of the vengeance he may expect from the criminals, he flees. As Dan searches for him, one man winds up dead, two critically wounded, and the man who a few short hours ago was an average law-abiding citizen is harried to the point where he is willing to shoot it cut with the police - until Dan manages to show the error of his ways.
Dan Mathews and his officers assist a county sheriff in closing down a club that offers illicit gambling.
A series of fraudulent insurance claims is discovered after Dan Mathews and his officers learn that the "accidental" death of a migrant worker was actually a homicide.
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Dan Mathews has reason to suspect the worst when a courier with a criminal record disappears with $31,000 after an automobile accident.
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Car thieves purchase wrecked vehicles and transfer the VIN plates to stolen ones in order to escape detection.
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A patient parolee decides the time is finally right to attempt the recovery of $250,000 stolen in an armored car robbery.
Two bikers (Clint Eastwood as 'Joe Keeley', John Compton as 'Nick West') ride stripped-down Harleys into town and stop at a cafe. They are shocked when the cafe owner (Jack Edwards as 'Bernie Sills') confronts them with a shotgun and orders them to leave.
As his wife calls the Highway Patrol her husband provokes the bikers, until Nick takes the gun from Sills and punches him. The bikers jump on their bikes and roar out of town.
When Sills learns his wife has called the law, he hides the gun and lies to the responding motorcycle cop, telling him the cyclists started the trouble. The cop takes off after the bikers, only to be struck and killed by a trucker who runs a red light.
Broderick Crawford’s ‘Chief Dan Mathews’ quickly sorts truth from fiction and arrests the café owner for assaulting the bikers. A nice (albeit unlikely) twist on the ‘bad guy bikers’ trope!
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An alert boy is able to give Dan Mathews information that provides a critical break in the pursuit of a recidivist thief.
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A Highway Patrol officer is murdered while pursuing a car stolen from a lonely bookstore owner.
Two thieves attempt to steal valuable paintings and demand ransom of $500,000. but they are forced to commit murder when the plan goes awry.
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A poor prospector arouses suspicion when he suddenly begins paying off long-standing debts from a large roll of new $100 bills.
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