Sam Johnson, a parole officer six months shy of retirement and a relatively dull life, gets stuck with Arnie Wilcox, a convicted rapist who's getting out early on good behavior. Not since Sam's wife was brutally raped and murdered 10 years ago has he been given this type of case; in fact, he's been pretty much just going through the motions since then.  Sam is more than surprised when the case lands in his lap, and even more so when he learns that this particular ex-convict is being sent to a coed mental institution instead of a men's halfway house. All Sam wants is to do is get his job done without any hassle, but that's not going to happen.  He becomes enraged when he is given strict instructions for overseeing Arnie, who seems to know only words that start with "F." It's bad enough to give Sam a case and then refuse to let him run it, and even worse to keep information from him. Complicating the matter, the woman Arnie raped, Eliza Richardson, is now a high profile Chief Executive Officer for her father's corporation, and reporters, including the persistent Tonya Mourning, and angry mobs are everywhere. The mental institution Arnie is sent to is run by Dr. Glenn Rathway, a man whom Sam doesn't trust; he thinks the place may not be completely legal.

Sam would love to forget the case and just hide out in the apartment that he use to share with his wife, but there's a kid hanging out at the apartment complex who reminds Sam of the past, so he can't stay there. More disturbingly, Sam keeps learning things about Arnie that just don't seem right. First, Sam finds letters on his desk that Arnie supposedly wrote to Eliza while in jail.  When Sam confronts Arnie, he finds out that Arnie can't read or write, so who wrote the letters? Next, Sam checks in with the psychiatrist who recommended Arnie for parole, only to discover that the psychiatrist never saw Arnie. In fact, he's new, and the old psychiatrist quit just before Arnie was paroled. The new guy doesn't seem to have a clue about what Arnie's crime was.  Feeling frustrated, and unable to ask Arnie a lot of questions, Sam approaches Tonya, the reporter who keeps hounding him, and accuses her of sending him the letters. However, when she shows Sam her own stack, he realizes that someone is setting Arnie up.

Now Sam is worried. He's seen Arnie at the institution called Rathways and knows that it's just a matter of time before Arnie blows his parole. With this in mind, Sam decides to meet Eliza, only to be almost killed by her bodyguards. Tonya comes to his rescue and this time Sam doesn't send her away. Sam is forced to drop his shield, and in doing so must face the kid at his apartment building - the kid whose older brother was one of the boys who raped and murdered Sam's wife. The kid who knows Sam made sure his brother was tried as an adult and sent to the worst jail possible, where his brother later died. The kid who, in spite of everything, keeps trying to tell Sam that his brother was always sorry. As the kid finally lets Sam know about his brother's wishes, Sam breaks down and Tonya helps him recover. He then discovers that Dr. Rathway's wife was also murdered, and that the same unknown source assigned both Sam and the good doctor to Arnie's case. Sam realizes that Eliza, with her wealth and power, has been pulling some strings. When he goes back to talk to her, Eliza's already gone - on her way to Rathways, Sam realizes.   With Tonya's help, Sam races to Rathways, fights his way inside and tries to save Arnie from Eliza's vengeance, but a crazed Dr. Rathway gets in the way. Sam kills the doctor, but not before Rathway gets off a shot at Arnie; the parolee dies in Sam's arms.

As Sam watches Eliza getting put in a police car, he learns that Arnie had never attacked Eliza. Arnie was just some white space, a blank filled in to fit a crime that had happened years earlier to a young Eliza, and because of his sorry circumstances all his life, he actually thought he deserved to be treated like an animal. Tired and depressed, Sam goes home and sees the kid waiting for him. Instead of running away, he faces him. Sam has seen what living in the past and holding on to hatred can do to you. He decides that enough sorry suckers have had to pay, including him, and he doesn't want to live that way anymore. He figures that maybe it's better to be alive then to just be taking up space day after day after day.