In the dazzlingly futuristic Washington D.C. of 2054, murder has been eliminated. John Anderton presides over the Department of Pre-Crime, wherein three "Pre-Cogs,"--precognitive humans drifting in a flotation tank, their brain waves tapped by computers--pick up thoughts of premeditated murder and warn the cops, who swoop down and arrest the would-be perpetrators before the killings can take place. Although the Pre-Cogs are never wrong sometimes they disagree. The dissenting Pre-Cog is said to have filed a minority report. If you could outsmart the Pre-Cog system, you would have committed the perfect crime. Bureau director Lamar Burgess tries to shield Anderton from bureaucrats like Danny Witwer of the Justice Department. As the pre-crime strategy prepares to go national, Witwer seems to have doubts about its wisdom--or he is only jealous of its success?
Washington, D.C. has been murder-free thanks to astounding technology which identifies killers before they commit their crimes. But when the chief of the Pre-crime unit is himself accused of a future murder, he has just 36 hours to discover who sets him up.