Michaela, Wes, Laurel and Patrick are ambitious first year law students at a prestigious, cutthroat East Coast Law School where only the best students are given a shot at participating in real cases. They compete against each other at all costs for the attention of brilliant, charismatic, and seductive Professor Annalise DeWitt in Criminal Law 101 aka HOW TO GET AWAY WITH MURDER.

Professor DeWitt (Viola Davis) is a master litigator and invites all four of these students who want to work on a high profile murder case. She manipulates them into doing dirty legal legwork like seducing someone to gain insight in the prosecution's case, or digging up dirt to discredit the star witness. Wes even witnesses Annalise having an affair, and soon learns her lover is actually an unwitting pawn on the witness stand. She wins her case with ease and the students question just how far they are willing to go to earn a seat next to her in a courtroom on the next case.

Although they know this formidable professor is dangerous, they will need her help, four months later, when they find themselves arguing out in the woods standing over a dead body. Now they are all entangled in a masterful, sexy, suspense-driven legal thriller from Shonda Rhimes and Betsy Beers, executive producers of Grey's Anatomy and Scandal.