In the summer of 1966, Richard Franklin Speck, a 22-year-old ordinary seaman, waiting for a berth aboard a merchant ship, murdered eight student nurses inside a townhouse in South Chicago, shocking the surrounding hardworking, religious community to its very core.

Twenty years later, Carly Rocket and her business partner, Mike Holtzer, find themselves inside Stateville Correctional Facility hired to cast extras for a Hollywood movie. Unbeknownst to her, Speck is one of Stateville's inmates. His infamous murders took place only blocks from her childhood home leaving her with deep emotional wounds.

Discovering that Speck is enjoying his life behind bars, Carly is outraged and conspires with a guard to make a videotape of Speck's uninhibited life in an attempt to change prison regulations. But it backfires, and suddenly Carly finds herself in danger of becoming Speck's ninth victim.