The 13th Man

District Attorney Robert E. Sutherland, who is running for re-election, is attempting to rid the city of racketeers and has already put twelve men behind bars. With only a few days left before the election, Sutherland broadcasts over the radio his intention to turn over to a grand jury evidence against the thirteenth man. His candidates for that distinction include one of his opponents, Henry L. Martin, who, Sutherland says, wants to turn the city over to the underworld; Louie Cristy, an ex-druggist and former bootlegger who now is a nightclub owner; and George Crandall, purveyor of crooked gambling machines and racing tip sheets. Sutherland also lashes out against the Globe-Times newspaper, which, he charges, has been hampering his efforts with their unjust attacks. After listening to the broadcast, Globe-Times reporter Swifty Taylor, who also is the nation's foremost radio commentator, asks his secretary, Julie Walters, to dinner later that evening. Julie, who, in the six months she has worked for Swifty has developed a concealed infatuation for him, leaves to get dressed, while Swifty goes to the fights, where he sees Sutherland and all of the men named in his broadcast. Also in attendance are Swifty's boss, publisher Andrew Baldwin, Stella Leroy, a torch singer at Cristy's club, her millionaire boyfriend, Jack Winslow, and Legs Henderson, whom Sutherland sent to prison for safecracking. As one of the fighters is knocked out, Sutherland falls dead, and Dr. Randolph Gorman, whom Sutherland got dismissed from his job at the county hospital because of graft, diagnoses the death as heart failure. As Swifty works on his story, his pal and fellow reporter, Jimmy Moran, who that night is to marry Baldwin's secretary and Julie's friend, Alice Bryant, snoops at the coroner's office and learns that Sutherland died from a thorn shot into his neck poisoned with curare, a drug that Malay headhunters put on poison darts. Swifty announces Jimmy's discovery over the air and then takes Julie to Cristy's nightclub where Stella is singing. After Swifty questions Cristy, who left the fights immediately after Sutherland slumped over, Winslow, angry at Swifty's characterization over the radio of him and Stella, picks a fight, but Swifty knocks him out. Lieutenant Tom O'Hara questions Cristy, Crandall and Martin but learns nothing. Before the wedding, Jimmy goes to Baldwin's house to investigate his hunch and finds, in a storage area near a suit of armor, a cigarette holder, which he puts into his pocket. He is then shot by an unseen assailant. Jimmy's body is found near a road by the police, and after O'Hara tells Swifty, Julie breaks the news to Alice. When O'Hara shows Swifty the cigarette holder found in Jimmy's pocket, Swifty reveals that Jimmy did not smoke. The next day, he examines Jimmy's desk and finds an old Sunday supplement section containing an article Jimmy wrote on the use of curare by Malay natives. After learning about Jimmy's call the previous night to Baldwin, Swifty broadcasts that he has a lead on the killer. After O'Hara tells Swifty that Legs Henderson was seen trying to crack the districk attorney's safe, which contains Sutherland's evidence against the thirteenth man, he shows Swifty the dart that killed Sutherland, and Swifty surmises that the cigarette holder was used to blow the dart into Sutherland's neck and that the killer forced Henderson to get Sutherland's evidence. Swifty then calls Baldwin and asks him to meet him for lunch. While Baldwin is gone from his home, Swifty goes to the room where Jimmy was killed and finds a piece of bark that was in the photograph in Jimmy's article. Although Swifty is kidnapped by Cristy, who is angry about the "heat" he and Stella are getting, he escapes with Julie's help and gives her the poison darts from the piece of bark to take to the police chemist to analyze. He then has all the suspects assembled in his studio as he begins his broadcast. As he is about to name the killer, he sees a man about to shoot him and gets out of the way. O'Hara then shoots the man, who turns out to be Baldwin, and Swifty identifies him as the underworld leader. He then announces that he will marry Julie and she readily agrees.