Deputy Jess Carlin (Audie Murphy) leaves his Texas hometown in disgrace, framed by corrupt saloon owner Luke Starr (Broderick Crawford) for a crime he didn't commit. When his brother, muckraking newspaper editor Roy Carlin (Víctor Vilanova), is murdered after printing an exposé of Starr's crooked deals, Carlin returns home from the Mexican border town where he's been holed up and enlists his brother's fiancée (Luz Márquez) and saloon dancer Kit O'Neal (Diana Lorys) to bring Starr down.
Convicted of slugging and robbing a miner, Renee Carter is being taken to Yuma prison; when the miner dies, she must return for trial, but Hollister believes she is covering up for a gambler, Frank Fallon, who will try to prevent her return.
Sheriff Clay Hollister sends for a woman lawyer to settle a dispute between a mine owner and a local businessman; Clay is unaware that one of the men has been stealing gold and putting it in blocks of ice.
When Bat transports a large herd of horses to Fort Bowie, a gang stages an ambush, killing many of Bat's men and stealing the herd; Bat must use his wits to recover the horses and bring the killers to justice.
Judge Jim Scott (Fred MacMurray) wants to sentence a killer to die, but the outlaw's family members intend otherwise. All-powerful patriarch Charlie Hayes (Robert Middleton) and his intimidating kinfolk are confident they can use violence to get their doomed relative's sentence commuted into something less severe. Although Sheriff Barney Wiley (John Ericson) wilts under the family's strong-arm tactics, Scott remains determined to see justice done at the end of a rope.