After FBI agent Frank Lacrosse believes his son was kidnapped by a notorious serial killer, he travels to Amarillo, Texas, where he believes the murderer is in hiding. Although officially taken off the case because of its personal significance to him, Frank continues to pursue the killer, causing concern for local sheriff Buck Olmstead. When another victim pops up at a nearby car garage, Frank knows that he is as close as he'll ever be to tracking down the elusive killer.
A woman on the run from her abusive husband encounters a mysterious hitch-hiker.
Detective Inspector Campbell (Gordon Jackson) looks into the murder of a teacher at a girls school where there are a number of suspects, including her colleagues and the married man she had been seeing.
Mary Henry ends up the sole survivor of a fatal car accident through mysterious circumstances. Trying to put the incident behind her, she moves to Utah and takes a job as a church organist. But her fresh start is interrupted by visions of a fiendish man. As the visions begin to occur more frequently, Mary finds herself drawn to the deserted carnival on the outskirts of town. The strangely alluring carnival may hold the secret to her tragic past.
Driving through the desert en route to San Francisco, Sebastian has a chance encounter with Helena, a mysterious and attractive hitchhiker. Together they embark on a journey to the unknown, testing the boundaries of reality along the way.
One evening, Hammer gives a ride to Christina, an attractive hitchhiker on a lonely country road, who has escaped from the nearby lunatic asylum. Thugs waylay them and force his car to crash. When Hammer returns to semi-consciousness, he hears Christina being tortured until she dies. Hammer, both for vengeance and in hopes that "something big" is behind it all, decides to pursue the case.
Frank Johnson, a sole witness to a gangland murder, goes into hiding and is trailed by Police Inspector Ferris, on the theory that Frank is trying to escape from possible retaliation. Frank's wife, Eleanor, suspects he is actually running away from their unsuccessful marriage. Aided by a newspaperman, Danny Leggett, Eleanor sets out to locate her husband. The killer is also looking for him, and keeps close tabs on Eleanor.
A guilt-ridden man blames himself for his wife's death and secretly pays an assassin to kill him. But then he finds out that his wife isn't dead at all. And now the assassin is on his trail, with no way to call off the hit.
Alex Ritt, a music video director comes to Italy to direct a video for pop sensation Stefania Stella. He soon encounters a mysterious killer who videotapes his victims for the police. As the horrible murders continue, Ritt is unknowingly pushed into the killer's games and he soon becomes a target of the police. The video-killer is on the loose and Ritt must find out the truth before it's too late.
Howard is mild-mannered and slightly simple-minded, with a habit of picking up teenage hitchhikers while driving his delivery routes. Sometimes the girls admit to being runaways, and if they claim to hate their mothers it drives Howard into a violent frenzy; his sister ran away from home years ago and was never heard from again, causing his desperate, addled mother to tighten her hold on him. Howard never remembers raping his victims or strangling them with wire coat hangers, though his boss does notice missed deliveries and late arrivals.
A private detective is hired to find a young heiress but finds himself accused of murder.
A woman uses a deck of cards to predict death within 24 hours for a stranger sitting at a bar, then tries to help him remember who he is based on items in his pockets.
Secret Service agents make a deal with a counterfeiting inmate to be released on early parole if he will help them recover some bogus moneymaking plates, but he plans to double-cross them.
Mr. Dean's body is found face down in the fireplace, burned beyond recognition. Nightclub-singer Eden Lane is convicted of the crime. She is escorted to prison by one of the arresting detectives when she convinces him that she just spotted the murderer outside their train.
A drifter claims the money in an old bank account. Soon he finds himself the target of two men who turn out to be the sons of the man's old partner, who is now in prison because of a conflict with him over the money in that account.
Newspaper reporter Michael Ward plunges into a nightmare of guilt, fearing that his "evidence" has sentenced the wrong man to death.
Dutch painter Jan-Van Rooyer hurries to keep a rendezvous with Jacqueline Cousteau, an elegant, sophisticated Frenchwoman, slightly his elder, whose relationship with him had turned from art student into one of love trysts. He arrives and is confronted by Detective Police Inspector Morgan who accuses him of having murdered Jacqueline. Morgan listens sceptically to the dazed denials of Van Rooyer as he tells the story of his relationship with the murdered woman. Morgan, after hearing the story, realizes that the mystery has deepened, and it becomes more complicated when the Assistant Commissioner, Sir Brian Lewis, explains that Jacqueline was not married but was being kept by Sir Howard Fenton, a high-ranking diplomat whose names must be kept out of the case.
When it rains in the city, a serial killer known as "The Judge" looks for his next strangling victim. For months, the madman has been stalking at night, leaving behind clues, but police efforts have been fruitless. Constructing a life-size dummy of the murderer, police Lt. Harry Grant is growing obsessed with capturing him, and always following Grant is the relentless reporter Ann Gorman looking to break the story, but the hunt continues.
Artist David Stuart is blinded by a jealous model whose portrait he is painting. His fiance's father generously offers his eyes for a sight restoring operation. There's only one hitch: Stuart has to wait until after the man dies. Not surprisingly, when the benefactor dies a very premature death, suspicion falls on the artist.
Attorney Wayne Fletcher and his secretary have an affair. When Wayne's wife is found smothered to death, he becomes the prime suspect. As the police investigate the murder, a psychic with questionable motives tries to contact the deceased woman. Soon, Wayne begins seeing visions of his dead wife, and other people involved with the case begin to be killed, one by one.