You will now feel the pain I have felt for the past ten years, Hank Tobin. You are going to know what it is like to have your son suffer for the sins of his father, which is the worst pain any man will ever know.
Hank Tobin had it all: a popular column in a New York newspaper, a Pulitzer prize, and wealth that enabled him to live his boyhood dreams. But his world is shattered when his son -- himself an aspiring journalist -- follows an anonymous tip to a can't-miss front-page story: the firebombing of a Brooklyn mosque. Hank's son is accused of the crime, arrested, and thrown into prison. Hank soon discovers that his son was framed by a man who has been waiting a decade to have his revenge.
Sitting in a seedy New York bar ten years earlier, Hank overheard a janitor bragging that his son torched the home of a minority family to keep the neighborhood white. Hank's story of the event made the front page. The boy spent ten years in prison and the family was destroyed -- a minor event in the life of the columnist, a life-altering event for the janitor and his family.
Hank's life is in ruins. Divorced from his wife -- whom he desperately wants back -- and estranged by his daughter, Hank has lost his reputation, his career, and his family. To save his son from a long prison sentence, Hank must confront the vengeful man whose life he once carelessly destroyed.