When a loner is found strangled to death in his rent-controlled apartment, Detectives Fontana and Green focus on both the victim's gambling habit and the building's owner who wants to convert it into a co-op, but the cops hit paydirt when they discover the dead man's nasty running feud with a spoiled pro basketball player. When the detectives find the athlete's fingerprints at the scene, prosecutors McCoy and Borgia must fight to keep the evidence from being tossed out on a technicality.