In prison again for stealing the woman's purse, and beating up a by-stander, Rubin continues his rants and fits of violence. In the movie, we are not even told about this incident. Carter talks about his fellow inmates in a manner that would be sickening to anyone else. He talks about how the electric chair is "stealing his friends away" for crimes they did not commit. One of his friends got the chair for this "unfortunate" incident. He and a friend held up a grocery store in the neighborhood with a gun. They locked the owner in a closet. "In trying to free himself, the proprietor suffered a heart attack and in falling, he struck his head against the door and died from the concussion." Carter says his friend didn't really do anything wrong, and that the man's death wasn't his fault.

Rubin Carter is released from prison at 25, and admits he's getting a little too old for prizefighting. But, nevertheless, he gets opportunities to fight, and makes some money doing so. But, he was FAR from being close to any kind of "championship", as Bob Dylan's song and the movie would have you believe. He started losing money, and blamed his manager, he now owed back taxes in the amount of $90,000. Once again, Carter does what he knows best, and ends up being suspect in several burglaries. He is also accused of several assaults.

After all of his dealings to date, he still proclaims that he was unjustly accused, etc.

-Now, comes the film's main storyline...The shooting at the bar. Here is where most of the evidence, official documents, recorded statements, lie detector results, etc. are contained.