Two years after the death of his wife and the seizure of his children by the state of California, petty criminal Jack Charles meets with his lawyer to discuss the terms of his impending jail sentence for robbing an undercover policeman posing as a drug dealer. Although he promises to stay out of trouble until he meets with the judge, Jack is surprised to find his teenage daughter Kelly at his Los Angeles apartment after breaking out of Bigelow Hall juvenile center. Kelly says that her seven-year-old brother, Eddie, is being moved from his foster home to the abusive, prison-like confines of Bigelow, and begs her father to have them transferred to a different facility. He ignores her pleas, and makes plans to steal $250,000 from a drug dealer in New Orleans, Louisiana. On the way back to Bigelow, Jack changes his mind and goes to court to request his children’s transfer. While the judge doubts Jack’s claims that Bigelow staff handcuffs the children, Kelly and Jack watch from their car as Lazzaro, the Bigelow overseer, shackles Eddie and the orphans and loads them onto a bus. Furious, Jack pulls his car in front of the bus and holds Lazzaro at gunpoint until he releases Eddie and Kelly’s pregnant friend, Delores. Evading police, Jack drops Delores at her former foster house and drives his children to see their grandmother, Rita, in Las Vegas, Nevada. Jack finds Rita gambling in a casino and pulls her away from the table moments before a security guard can apprehend her for cheating. Shocked to meet her grandchildren, Rita agrees to let them stay for one night, but scolds her son when he attempts to sneak away after dark. In the morning, she alerts him that several newspaper headlines are labeling him as a “madman,” and the Charles family is forced to continue their journey east. When a police officer spots them, a high-speed car chase ensues until the squad car flips over. To put an end to the children’s constant whining, Jack stops at Hoover Dam and telephones Kathleen Mercer, writer of one of the newspaper articles, to complain about her erroneous reporting. When police catch up to them, Jack rigs another tourist’s car to drive over the cliff, leading onlookers to believe he was inside and died in the resulting explosion. After reuniting with Kelly and Eddie, Jack steals another car and they head to New Orleans. At a roadside bar, Jack again telephones Kathleen to dispute certain points she published about Kelly’s previous life in foster care. Eager to hear the truth behind his story, Kathleen asks him to question his daughter about Bigelow’s problematic disciplining policies. When she hears that Kelly’s pregnant friend Delores has been seized from her foster mother and returned to Bigelow, Kathleen investigates the institution for corruption. Meanwhile, as the hour grows late, Jack begins to doze at the wheel and forces Kelly to drive. Just after daybreak, Kelly swerves to avoid colliding with a semi-trailer truck, and crashes their car. Escaping on foot, the fugitives jump into a speedboat hitched to another traveler’s pickup truck, and help themselves to the owner’s food. As they eat, Jack asks if Kelly was ever sexually abused in Bigelow. The girl defensively denies it, and when the driver stops, Jack uses a payphone to call Kathleen, informing her of his suspicion that his daughter was mistreated. While on the phone, the owner of the boat drives away with Kelly and Eddie still onboard. Jack eventually catches up to them, but Kelly is annoyed that her father’s reckless behavior is setting a bad example for Eddie, who has grown attached to him. Once the boat is docked in a Louisiana lake, Jack turns on the engine and hijacks the vessel through the wetlands. Pursued by police and news helicopters, Kelly sets off a flare gun, creating a smoke screen that allows them to jump overboard undetected. The fugitives hitchhike to New Orleans to find Jack’s contact, Jerry. On the phone with Kathleen, Jack learns that his lawyer has negotiated a reduced, two-year sentence if he agrees to return to Los Angeles and testify against Lazzaro’s corrupt foster care system. Jack refuses. The next morning, Kelly is dejected when she reunites with Andy, a former Bigelow intern, whose friendliness she misinterpreted as affection. Later, Jack and Jerry drive onto a ferryboat to meet the drug dealers they intend to rob, hoping to garner enough money to move to Belize and start a new life. In the middle of the operation, however, Jack realizes his children are hiding in the trunk. When he gets out of the car to release them, the drug dealers flee, shooting Jerry in the scuffle. Although Jack considers killing them and stealing the money for himself, he remembers the presence of his children and puts his gun away. Back in Los Angeles, Lazzaro appears in court, asserting that Kelly is a “troubled youth” who ran away to pursue her obsession with Andy. After a brief meeting, Jack and Kathleen barge into the courtroom, and Jack offers his defense, assisted by Kelly’s implication that Lazzaro witnessed and subsequently ignored her sexual assault at Bigelow. In an emotional speech, Jack pleads for the custody of his children after the completion of his two-year sentence. On the day of his release, Kelly and Eddie wait with Kathleen outside the prison and greet their father with a hug.