Chief of Police Bill Gillespie (Carroll O'Connor) has long directed the forces of law enforcement of the small cotton town when Virgil Tibbs (Harold Rollins) returns to Sparta, MI for his mother's funeral. Mayor Findley (guest star Dennis Lipscomb), sensing the opportunity to influence black voters in his quest for higher elective office, asks Tibbs to remain in Sparta as Chief of Detectives under Gillespie. When a local co-ed is brutally murdered, Gillespie, who resents Tibbs being thrust upon him by the Mayor, must work with the Tibbs to solve the crime. Tibbs, suspecting the truth of the murder, is soon the victim of an attempt on his life. Gillespie and Tibbs now join forces in earnest and ultimately discover a tangled web of guilt and deception. (Part 1 of 2)