In an Indiana city, a gunman in a parking garage fires into a rush-hour crowd in a public plaza, killing five apparently random victims with six shots.

Reacher, a former Army military police officer and now a drifter, is 1,500 miles (2,400 km) away, but sees the news on CNN and gets on a bus to Indiana.

When Reacher was an investigating military policeman years past, Barr had gone on a killing spree similar to the Indiana shootout, murdering four men during the war in Kuwait.

Local NBC news reporter Ann Yanni is looking for information about the case, and Reacher includes her in his investigation, in exchange for the use of her car and a guaranteed public exposé on Barr.

Reacher drives to Kentucky to the shooting range where the sniper practiced and learns more facts from Gunny Samuel Cash, the former US Marine who owns the place.

Reacher gets closer to the unseen enemy pulling the strings, leading him to the real perpetrators, a Russian gang masquerading as legitimate businessmen.

The real killer is shot, the Zec chooses to confess to the authorities who arrive on the scene, Barr goes free, and Reacher moves on.

A premiere at Pittsburgh's Southside Works megaplex on 15 December, to have been attended by the film's stars and Child, was postponed following the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.