Herta Schwarz

Ted Talbot is a prosecutor in Newtonville. In the course of his work, he accuses Jim Conley of robbing a bank and killing the cashier. Ted's wife Jane takes over Conley's defense. When the court sentences the defendant to death, she files for divorce. Beth Conley, the wife, goes to see the prosecutor and asks him to postpone the execution of the sentence for thirty days. When he refuses, she threatens him with revelations. Deputy District Attorney Hal Young witnesses this confrontation...

The story of the 18 year old prostitute Fanny who falls back into her old life after being released from a reform school run by nuns. The feeble-minded Frieder tries to liberate her, fails, and pays for it with his life.

With the death of her mother, eight-year-old Anna ends her childhood: From now on, she has to look after the nine-member family. Deprivation-rich years, which also find no end when Anna marries: Her husband Albert must be a soldier in the Second World War, and the pregnant Anna has to work hard in the farm and care sick relatives. Lonely and exposed to the harassment of the tyrannical mother-in-law, she waits for Albert, with no certainty that he will ever return.

Jozi's aunt runs an inn near the border and has a little side-job: she smuggles. Poor, naive Jozi doesn't know anything about it. Jozi falls in love with the young border patrol officer Hans and her feelings are amply returned. But Hans' supervisor suspects Jozi of smuggling and tries again and again to lead her into illegal temptation. Finally, Hans sees Jozi in a dance bar together with smugglers and believes, too, that she's one of their accomplices.