While the City Sleeps

New York City newspaper The Day is in trouble. Even though editor Ed Hutcheson has worked hard running the paper, its circulation has been steadily declining. Now the publisher's widow wants to sell the paper, which will most likely mean its end. Hutcheson's only hope is to finish his exposé on a dangerous gangster before the sale is finalized.

Davey Gordon, a New York City boxer at the end of his career, falls for dancer Gloria Price. However, their budding relationship is interrupted by Gloria's violent boss, Vincent Rapallo, who has eyes for Gloria. The two decide to skip town, but before they can, Vincent and his thugs abduct Gloria, and Davey is forced to search for her among the most squalid corners of the city, with his enemy hiding in the shadows.

Unhappily married Richard Mason concocts a meticulous scheme to kill his shrewish wife so that he'll be free to marry her sister.

Pursued by the big-time gambler he robbed, John Muller assumes a new identity—with unfortunate results.

A psychotic man opens fire in a diner, murdering numerous people before killing himself. The survivors struggle in different ways following this horrendous event: a doctor doubts his own instincts and elects to use an experimental medical procedure on his wife, while a gambler believes he's on a lucky streak. A waitress begins engaging in promiscuous sex, and a young girl whose father is among the dead gains unexpected fame.

An innocent man turns fugitive as he reconstructs events that implicate him for a murder and robbery he did not commit.

After a former model is drowned in her bathtub, Detective James Halloran and Lieutenant Dan Muldoon attempt to piece together her murder.

A crooked politician finds himself being accused of murder by a gangster from whom he refused help during a re-election campaign.

A prisoner leads his counterparts in a protest for better living conditions which turns violent and ugly.

After surviving a murder attempt, an auto magnate goes into hiding so his wife can pay for the crime.