When Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990, Tom Lynch and his fellow contractor John White decided to get out of Iraq while they still could, but were captured by Iraqi soldiers and taken to a notorious prison in Baghdad, where they must listen to inmates being tortured to death.

After accepting an offer to work as a hostess in Japan, Jackie Nichols meets a charming Israeli drug smuggler and agrees to smuggle hashish with him. She gets away with it four times, but the fifth time, she's not so lucky.

A 28-year-old English teacher named Tim Schrader agrees to smuggle eight kilos of heroin into the U.S. to solve his financial problems. Although he knows he could receive the death penalty, the money is too tempting to resist.

With his girlfriend pregnant, American musician Michael Morey needs money and agrees to smuggle cocaine from Quito to Spain. He barely makes it through Ecuadorian customs, but when he lands and goes through Spanish customs, he's not so lucky.

A jungle adventure turns sour when American backpacker Mark Wedeven and his travel companions are taken hostage by armed guerilla soldiers in Panama.