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Extortion was designed as a sort of trial balloon for Columbia's new contractees Scott Colton and Mary Russell. The story takes place on a college campus, where a distinctively unpopular professor is murdered. When her physics-teacher father (Thurston Hall) falls under suspicion, co-ed Betty Tisdale (Mary Russell) turns to campus newspaper editor Larry Campbell (Scott Colton). Dissatisfied with the slowness of police procedure, Betty, Larry and their fellow students conduct their own investigation, unearthing a hotbed of scholastic intrigue and double-crossing. The much-hated victim is played by Albert Von Dekker, who'd later streamline his professional monicker as Albert Dekker and go on to a distinguished film career; ironically, Dekker would himself be the victim of a spectacular demise in 1968, which may or may not have been a sex murder.