 Having strung along with delinquent friends to a home robbery that ends in a wealthy old woman s death, Manila slum youth Sonny (Cogie Domingo) is too stunned to get away while the others elude police capture. He s duly convicted of murder -- worse, as an adult, since the orphan boy s birth certificate was lost in a fire, and his callous foster parents are nowhere to be found. Thrown into lockup among hardened lifers, the terrified 16-year-old soon finds himself at the mercy of various strong-arm cliques on death row. He s courted by booty-bandit Gabino (Pen Medina), who plots to seize cell block "mayor" Mio s (Ray Ventura) status as chief executor of the in-house drug trade controlled by rich prisoner Assunta (Tony Mabesa). A few figures take a more protective than exploitive interest in the new fish. But Sonny s best ally, it turns out, is old-school gangster Sinat (Eddie Garcia), who at 77 is still gruff and imposing enough to survive outside all the block s warring factions. He also has the support of distant relative Gina (Jaclyn Jose), a church-sponsored legal advocate. As he is uninterested in the early-release petition she offers, he encourages her to take up Sonny s case instead.