The mentally ill Dr. Fenwick is a supporter of the therapeutic value of role-playing in psychiatry. He kills the head of the sanatarium where he is a patient and assumes the man's identity. He locks doctors and nurses in the attic and gives their responsibilities to other patients. Things run rather smoothly until Natalie Rivers, the neice of the now dead head of the sanatarium, arrives for a visi...

Larry Duke is an actor making his motion picture debut in Hollwood when he gets a phone call from his New York girlfriend Janice Brandt. Janice is an olderwoman who sacraficed her marriage and Hollywood career in order to advance Larry's career. She informs Larry that her husband Ed followed her to New York showed up drunk at her apartment and was knocked unconscious in a scuffle. Larry convinces ...

When his teenage son Tommy is found murdered in the town of Northfield, John Cooley sets out to avenge the boys death. John is a religious fanatic who believes he is on a mission from God. When he finds a piece of car headlight at the murder scene, he seeks out and kills the car's original owner Frency La Font and an elderly librarian who had some connection to the car. With all the murders, the r...

During a lovers' quarrel Dandy Arthur kills his ex-girlfriend. Unfortunately, a button torn from her coats lands in his pocket during the struggle. His wife finds the button and Dandy sets out to kill her as well. Eventually, however, Dandy gives himself away by talking too much and is arrested by the police.

Jim Derry is a hit man who is hired to kill a bookie named Eddie Breech. He begins to have second thoughts when he finds out that Eddie's wife Connie is confined to a wheelchair and is being cheated on by her husband. He talks to the Breechs and agrees to help the two fake Eddie's death so that Derry can get paid for the hit and the two can start over in Mexico. Derry goes to the morgue and aquire...

Mrs. Logan calls Sheriff Ben Wister when she begins to believe that her neighbor Harry Jarvis killed his wife and buried her in his back yard. She notes that Harry has been acting strangely. He has been digging in the yard all night and has been drinkinf beer all day. She also notes that Mrs. Jarvis's annoying little dog has also gone missing. When the police interview him, Harry claims that his w...

Miles Crawford is a former actor turned lawyer. He gets an oppotunity to practice both professions when his son Tod is arrested an put on trial for murder. Tod is guilty but Miles makes an impassioned summation that manages to sway both the judge and the jury. Unfortunately, the prosecutor is a movie fan and he points out that Miles's summation was lifted word for word from a old movie in which Cr...

Medical student Skip Baxter has an alcohol problem and a practical joke playing roomate named Doc Carroll. Doc wants Skip to quit drinking and cooks up a scheme. He takes a cadaver from the medical school morgue and dresses it to look like a waitress named Ruth. He then puts it into Skip's bed as he is sleeping off a hangover. When Skip wakes up, he sees the body and becomes convinced that he comm...

Fred Kruger, Al Norman, and Terry are three ex-convicts who are now gainfully employed as garage mechanics. One day, they decide to break into a payroll office. They are unable to open the safe, so the take it with them to the garage. Unfortunately, the safe contains, not only money, but also a lethal radioactive isotope which, if released, could poison the city.

Academy Award hopeful Lana Layne's past comes back to haunt her when her husband George, an ex-convict who she thought was dead, wants her back. She's not interested, but if she does divorce him, he would get half of everything. Then there's Haila French, a gossip columnist who wants an exclusive story, so she surprises Lana and her boyfriend with surprising results.

Gerald Swiney, a henpecked husband, decides to get rid of his nagging wife, Edith, when she won't agree to a divorce. He intends to drive her away by making her think he's planning to kill her, but things don't go exactly as planned.

Brown is a chronic gambler and bigamist who starts to run out of money when his wealthy wives start turning up dead. The police suspect that he is responsible for murder, but when no evidence turns up they are forced to conclude that each death was a suicide. The real murderer is one of Brown's wives who jealously wants to keep her husband all to herself. She tells him that if he strays again she ...

Tony Grainger is a young boy who gets fifteen dollars for his birthday. He asks his father Steven to take him to an out-of-the-way magic shop so that he can spend it. Mr. Dulong, the mysterious owner of the shop, takes an interest in the boy and agrees to teach him everything he knows about magic. Despite his father's protests Tony is invited to step into a cabinet by Mr. Dulong. Ignoring his fath...

Grace Renford is a wealthy and attractive woman who is interested in meeting a man who will love her, not for her money, but for what she is. So she pretends to be a middle class woman after corresponding with a young engineer named Keith Holloway, who she met through an ad in a spiritualism magazine.

Marcia Fowler accuses a neighborhood boy named Roy Bullock of being a peeping Tom. Roy denies it and manages to ingratiate himself with Marcia's husband, Jack, and her lonely stepson. When Marcia gets an obscene phone call she tells Jack that it was Roy, but he denies it. Later, after Jack goes away on a business trip, Marcia confronts Roy after receiving another obscene phone call and becomes fea...

Near the end of World War II, a phony medium named Adelaide Winters cheats grieving families of soldiers killed in battle by pretending to communicate with ghosts. When she meets a wealthy widower named Edward Porter and finds out that his son was killed in battle, she insists that he join her seance. Edward reluctantly joins and begins to believe in Adelaide powers. Eventually, he proposes marria...

At a carnival sideshow, a farmer named Charlie Hill buys a strange jar, which brings him notoriety and respect in the community because people travel for miles to gather in his parlor and look at the jar and it's obscure content. But his young wife, Thedy Sue, is frightened of it and insists that he throw it out.

A convicted bank robber John Perry is sentenced to 15 years hard labor in a state prison lumber camp. Determined to get out, James befriend an alcoholic inmate named Doc. Doc is in charge of the prison infirmary as well as burials for the dead. Doc makes an offer to John: if John will fincance an operation for Doc's granddaughter, he will get him out of prison. Doc's plan is to hide Perry inside t...

Lee Griffin is an actor who is reunited with his old girlfriend Diana at a London production of a play being financed by Diana's husband Charles Justin. Lee and Diana rekindle their old romance and hatch a plot to kill her husband who is a wealthy diamond merchant. Lee's first attempt to kill Charles fails, but he succeeds on his second try. On a trip to Paris, Lee assumes Charles's identity. Unfo...

James Parkerson is a psychology professor who places an ad in the newspaper offering advice on how to murder one's spouse. He gets a response from the police, but manages to convince them that he is merely gathering research for an experiment. Later, he is contacted by a man named Robert Johnson who is searching for a way to kill his lover's husband. From Johnson's description of his lover and her...

After being the repeated victim of harassing phone calls, Helen Clarvoe asks a lawyer Paul Blackshear to investigate a woman named Dorothy Johnson who may be behind the calls. Dorothy blames Helen for the break-up of her wedding engagement. Paul investigates and finds the unexpected.

Newlyweds Dave and Bonnie Snowden visit the abandoned home of Bonnie's late father. In the home, Dave finds a locked door and comes to believe that there is something valuable inside. Later, Dave and Bonnie tell Bonnie's elderly mother Mrs. Daniels that they are married. Bonnie's mother is convinced that Dave is after her daughter inheritance. She tries to bribe Dave to annull the marriage. Dave r...

Sheridan Westcott kills his wife, hides it in his Rolls Royce, and heads to a nearby lake to dispose of it. While he is checking the water level in the lake, his car is stolen by a car thief named Philadelphia Harry.

Gerald and Milly Musgrove successfully steal $100,000 dollars, but run into the problem of where to hide the money. The couple befriend an elderly and somewhat senile woman named Emmy Rice. After a visit to her home, Gerald stashes the money in a stack of old magazines. Later, he convinces the old woman to name him in her will.

A elderly woman is locked in an air tight safe, with one of her cats, by her niece's fiancé when she discovers he is a forger.

Donnelly Rhodes (as James Bellington) Lonny Chapman (as Lt. Wymar) Lou Jacobi (as Dr. Glover) Neile Adams (as Sgt. Louise Marklen) Jess Kirkpatrick (as Thomas Grindley) Sandra Gould (as Secretary) Betty Harford (as Woman in Museum) Harold Ayer (as Salesman) Police become suspicious of an unsuccessful artist named James Bellington after a city commissioner of parks and recreation recieves a series ...

Karl Jorla is a European horror movie star that is contracted by a Hollywood studio to appear in his first American film. The producers of the film watch a demo film of Jorla as the leader of a satanic cult and feel that he will be perfect for their new film. After he comes to America, Jorla becomes worried that real satanists are after him. He thinks they may want to kill him for allowing his dem...

Charlie Osgood has been robbing his partner Eddie Turtin for years. When Eddie finds out, he threatens to go to the police unless Charlie can give him back what he stole. Determined not to ply, Charlie and his girlfriend Danielle decide to fake Charlie's suicide and then leave the country. Charlie gives Eddie hints of suicide and then throws an explosives laden dummy over a bridge. After blowing u...

George Maxwell is a former playboy who has just married his boss's daughter Mavis. George, however, must meet an ex-girlfriend to give her money. He arrives in a cab only to find his ex-girlfriend dead. He heads back home, but the next day the cabbie who drove him to the murder scene threatens him with blackmail. George tells his Mavis and she kills the cab driver and buries his body in the rose g...

Ned Murray is a lawyer who gets Lew Rydell off on a murder charge, but later learns that he is guilty. Knowing that Lew cannot be tried twice for the same crime, Ned seeks out other ways to bring the man to justice. He talks to a gangster Tony Hardeman who misinterprets Ned's concern and decides to have Lew killed. Ned suspects that a murder is about to take place and tries to save Lew. He arrives...

Howard Clements is wrongfully accused of assaulting a woman named Isabel Smith. He is convicted of the crime and is sent to prison for two years. When he gets out of prison he steals $13,000 which is the exact amount he would have earned if he had not been in prison. He then opens a record store in his hometown. He meets Isabel a few times and manages to get a date with her. Eventually the two bec...

Bessie Carnby and her daughter Camilla have been feuding with their neighbors Henry and Samantha Wilkins. In order to patch things up Bessie invites them over for dinner. Samantha refuses to go, but Henry goes and tries to act friendly. Later, he disappears and Bessie sees Samantha digging a hole in her barn. Bessie accuses Samantha of murder and calls the police. The police dig up the hole and fi...