Alan Beaven

Alan A. Beaven, 48, of the Oakland, Calif., area, was an environmental lawyer known for working on high-profile clean-water cases. After spending several weeks at a bucolic spiritual retreat in the Catskills, he was on his way home to try one last case--a federal trial in Sacramento--before beginning a yearlong sabbatical, friends and colleagues said.

Profile courtesy of THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE.