A dishonest sheriff jails Ben on trumped-up traffic charges. In order to work off the $50 fine imposed on him, Ben will have to spend 25 days on a work detail building a lodge for the sheriff. A woman befriends Ben after he fixes her car (on the sheriff's orders), and she offers to help him escape if he will retrieve a file the sheriff has on her. Ben gets the file, but the woman backs out of her end of the deal after Ben witnesses an inmate's murder at the hands of the sheriff. When Ben refuses to leave the town forgetting what he saw, the sheriff decides to make Ben the next ""accidental death"" victim at the work site.