Lawrence Horn, a former record producer and Motown Records executive, is sentenced to life in prison for hiring Detroit-based hit man James Perry to murder his wife, quadriplegic son and the wealthy family's overnight nurse at their suburban home in Silver Spring, Maryland. Horn's son is the victim of medical malpractice and as the result of a subsequent lawsuit, has a trust worth nearly $2 million, which his father stands to inherit in the wake of his death. Detectives discover that Perry used how-to book "Hit Man: A Technical Manual for Independent Contractors" as a guide to execute the murders. The families of the victims go on to file a class-action lawsuit against the Colorado-based publisher Paladin Press. The attorneys representing the families then hire Rodney Smolla, a First Amendment attorney and professor at William & Mary Law School, to consult on the historic case, which takes five years to settle amidst a series of shocking and bizarre developments.