Lena baker is the story of one woman's attempt to rise above the challenges of life, the choices she makes, and the consequences of those choices. The moment Lena baker (Tichina Arnold) thinks she has overcome her inner demons, she is called to work for a tyrannical white man, Elliott Arthur (Peter Coyote), a father, a mill worker, and a drunk. They develop a highly charged relationship that society deems inappropriate for the time.

His regular physical and mental abuse keeps Lena away from her children and mother (Beverley Todd). After imprisoning her in his home, Lena stands up and attempts to break free from his bondage. A struggle ensues, and Elliott Arthur, a white man, is shot by Lena Baker, an African American woman, on a hot humid night in South west Georgia in 1945. She is arrested soon after by the town's sympathetic sheriff (Michael Rooker).

A jury of 12 white men, her subpoenaed peers, found Lena guilty of murder in less than 6 hours. She received the death penalty as her sentence, earning Lena Baker a place in history as the first and only woman to be sentenced to death by the electric chair in the state of Georgia.

She was pardoned posthumously in 2005.