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Mt St Helens: Back From the Dead

Thirty years after the massive eruption, could it happen again? Airing May 4, 2010 at 9 pm on PBS Aired May 4, 2010 on PBS

Program Description

One of the most violent natural disasters of our time, the colossal eruption of Mt. St. Helens in 1980 blasted away an entire mountainside. Over 200 square miles of pristine forest were buried under millions of tons of lava, ash, mud, and avalanche debris. How could life ever return to this barren moonscape? A lone ecologist, Charlie Crisafulli, spent months in the blast zone and was astonished and puzzled by how quickly plants and animals colonized the wasteland. In this program, stunning cinematography and time-lapse photography trace the dramatic story of how Crisafulli witnessed life's return and figured out the puzzle. Now another question arises: How soon could another catastrophic eruption occur?

Mt. St. Helens: Back From the Dead

PBS Airdate: May 4, 2010

NARRATOR: Mount St. Helens: the biggest volcanic eruption in North America in nearly a century. Virtually all life for 200 square miles is wiped out. It seems impossible life could ever return to this barren wasteland.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI (Ecologist, United States Department of Agriculture Forest Service): We found a lot of our conventional wisdom was just flat wrong.

NARRATOR: In recent years there are ominous signs the volcano is awakening.

JOHN PALLISTER (Geologist, United States Geological Survey): These things were like skyscrapers that were being shoved out of the ground. They were literally that big.

NARRATOR: A 30-year quest to understand one of the most complicated volcanoes in the world is revealing new mysteries, deep inside the mountain.

JOHN PALLISTER: We don't know whether it's going to erupt explosively again in two years or in 20 years or in 200 years.

NARRATOR: Is Mount St. Helens preparing to erupt again? Right now, on NOVA: Mount St. Helens: Back from the Dead.

October 2004: Mount St. Helens comes back to life. Steam and ash spew from the crater on the mountain's summit.

JOHN PALLISTER: We saw the boiling material come out of the ground. We saw that it was blasting up. It was dark and it was light at the same time. It made a plume that rose up over the rim of the caldera and drifted downwind. It came up to above our altitude, to 10- or 12,000 feet.

NARRATOR: It's a frightening development. For years, Mount St. Helens has been quiet.

JON MAJOR (Geologist, United States Geological Survey): The volcano went from quiet to unrest to eruption very, very rapidly.

NARRATOR: It could be headed for a massive explosion.

DANIEL DZURISIN: (Geologist, United States Geological Survey): It seemed possible that we were headed toward an explosive eruption. We didn't know. That was a key question.

NARRATOR: The effort to understand what is happening inside the mountain couldn't be more urgent. Is the volcano about to repeat the events of three decades earlier, when it shattered the tranquility of its peaceful surroundings?

Spring, 1980: Mount St. Helens is one of the major peaks in the Cascade Mountains. It's an area of outstanding beauty, rich in wildlife. For over 120 years, the volcano has been quiet, but in recent weeks it's been rumbling. Nobody is sure what to expect. Then, on May 18, 1980, a 5.1-magnitude earthquake rocks the mountain.

Within 10 seconds, the volcano's northern flank collapses in the largest landslide in recorded history. It releases millions of tons of magma, in a colossal explosion. A cloud of searing gas and rock, known as a pyroclastic flow, races over the surrounding countryside.

Forests are flattened. Four miles below the summit, an enormous lake is choked with debris. The eruption continues to shoot poisonous steam and ash miles into the air.

JOHN PALLISTER: It was just, again, astounding is the best word to describe what happened in 1980, here in Mount St. Helens.

NARRATOR: The northern slope of the mountain is buried in several feet of ash. Virtually all life is extinguished. Fifty-seven people are dead. They include loggers, campers, scientists and a reporter. Some are up to 13 miles away, in areas considered safe.

The plume of steam and ash rises miles into the sky, for the rest of the day. The drifting ash cloud disrupts air traffic for hundreds of miles. The scale of the destruction is enormous.

Across more than 200 square miles the surge of ash and rock incinerates trees. Thousands of birds, from more than a hundred species, disappear. Billions of insects are gone. Deer and elk are wiped out. This vast area of devastation becomes known as the blast, or blowdown, zone.

Nearer the crater, ash and rocks from the landslide litter the northern slope of the mountain. It looks like the moon. It's called the pumice plain. It's directly below the crater.

Four miles from the volcano, the enormous Spirit Lake is scarcely recognizable. The avalanche has lifted its bed more than 200 feet. The surface is smothered in dead trees. Hundreds of species of aquatic life, including insects, amphibians and fish, are killed.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: It was black water. And it de-gassed and bubbled, and there were hot springs that were coming up. If you were to put your fingers in, to your wrist, and wiggle them, you wouldn't even be able to see your fingertips. That's how grossly modified the water was.

NARRATOR: Mount St. Helens is now a lifeless jumble of shattered forest, rock and ash. It's hard to imagine life will ever return.

The eruption was so powerful, it's altered the shape of the mountain. Mount St. Helens was a typical cone-shaped volcano, known as a stratovolcano, but the landslide has torn 1,300 feet off the summit, leaving a gaping crater a mile wide and 2,000 feet deep. It's the largest volcanic eruption in North America in nearly a century.

Weeks after the eruption, scientists arrive at the crater. The volcano is still steaming and rumbling. It's a new and unfamiliar world.

One of the first to arrive is Dan Dzurisin.

DAN DZURISIN: There was a tremendous amount of steam, and you could see... It was very hot. You didn't see red lava oozing out of the ground; you didn't see fantastic fire fountains. There was this constant background roar of rocks cascading down the crater walls. Occasionally, a very large rock, the size of the helicopter, would come bouncing down, and you could watch it, and it was almost slow-motion, because the crater was so large.

NARRATOR: Mount St. Helens has a long history of eruptions. More than 500 years ago, two massive explosions took place within two years of each other. They were nearly four times larger than May 1980.

The mountain sits on one of the most active seismic zones in the world, the Pacific Ring of Fire, a vast arc of volcanoes running for thousands of miles. It's home to some of the biggest and most dangerous volcanoes active today. Here, the enormous plates making up the earth's crust are being squeezed together. Along the coast, the plate below the Pacific is sliding under the North American Plate. Sixty miles down, pressure and friction melt the rock; magma wells up. When it reaches the surface, it bursts out.

But there are still many unanswered questions. Scientists' understanding of what triggers an eruption this massive is incomplete. And given the scale of destruction, they need to find a way to predict when it might happen again, before it's too late. Mount St. Helens is about to become one of the most intensely studied volcanoes in the world.

The mysteries are not just geological. Biologists want to know if any life has survived and what its future will be.

Charlie Crisafulli, one of the leading experts on the mountain's ecology, arrives soon after the eruption.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: Nothing could have prepared me for the sights and sounds that I saw when I got here. It was complete and utter barrenness, and there was no sign of life whatsoever.

NARRATOR: His job is to survey the mountain looking for any living things.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: It was just intriguing to think about. How would life come back to this landscape? What would the patterns be? How would the rate be?

NARRATOR: Much of the mountain is still inaccessible, so he starts work in the blowdown zone, in an area some eight miles downhill from the crater.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: We flew over in a helicopter very close to the ground. We would have these bumping, twisting flights across the landscape following a contour.

NARRATOR: In the first three months, there's nothing but dead and uprooted trees. Then he notices something: signs of freshly disturbed earth.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: Lo and behold, on many occasions, brown earth on top of the grey volcanic ash.

NARRATOR: Is there something down there? Crisafulli returns on foot to investigate.

There, emerging from the ash, is a tiny burrowing animal. It's a northern pocket gopher.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: It was, er, very thrilling.

NARRATOR: How can it possibly have survived when nothing else has?

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: This tiny animal lives entirely beneath the ground, so when the blast occurred, it would have been safely, uh, protected, beneath a mantel of soil, and may very well have survived in many locations.

NARRATOR: Over the following months, he finds more gophers. It appears that life is returning to the mountain, just three months after the eruption.

By fall, the volcano is still active. Plumes of steam and ash continue to shoot thousands of feet into the air, but something else is happening too. The crater floor appears to be moving. Is the mountain preparing for another major eruption?

DAN DZURISIN: We would sometimes notice a crack that hadn't been there the day before, and, by the end of the day, the crack was larger. And you realized that the ground was moving beneath your feet.

NARRATOR: It's an unsettling experience to stand on the floor of a volcano that's visibly moving.

DAN DZURISIN: If you stood and looked very, very, very carefully, with a reference point in the background, sometimes you could see it move, but just barely.

NARRATOR: The scientists set up a time-lapse camera on a nearby ridge.

Over several days, the pictures show a dome rising in the middle of the crater floor. The volcano is oozing a sticky gray lava, cooling as it reaches the surface.

Over several months, the dome grows larger. The geologists are puzzled. What is going on inside the mountain? Is Mount St. Helens simply rebuilding its summit, or is it about to blow up?

DAN DZURISIN: We didn't know what might come next, whether the lava might continue to grow for many years, or even decades or centuries. And we didn't know if there might be explosive eruptions in store.

NARRATOR: Then winter closes in, restricting access to the mountain. The scientists' work is limited. Answers will have to wait until spring.

Spring, 1981: nearly a year after the initial eruption, life returns to the hills and valleys of the Cascade Range, but on Mount St. Helens, the devastation of the previous year is still obvious.

Despite the danger, Crisafulli moves closer to the active volcano's core.

The pumice plain is buried in several feet of coarse ash. It's a dusty barren wilderness. Life seems impossible.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: This is an area where super-hot incandescent flows came down and killed all life that was here.

NARRATOR: Helicopter is the only way in.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: We were flying back and forth, very low, just above the ground surface, looking for any form of life.

NARRATOR: He crisscrosses the area, but there's nothing to see. Then, suddenly, amidst the acres of barren rock, there's an unexpected flash of color.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: So we set this helicopter down, and we walked up. Right out in the center of the pumice plain, we saw a plant.

NARRATOR: At first, Crisafulli can hardly believe his eyes.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: It was a prairie lupine, a species that typically grows high in the slopes of Mount St. Helens.

NARRATOR: It's not only growing, it's flourishing.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: Not only had the plant established, at that point it was in full flower. It was quite remarkable. When we saw the first one we were very surprised.

NARRATOR: It's only four miles from the volcano's crater. It's the first sign of life in an area where everything has been extinguished. But how has the plant managed to grow in such a barren area? The answer is a special root structure that provides its own fertilizer.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: These are little factories, where bacterium works with the plant and, um, provides nitrogen, um, to the plant. In return, the plant provides the bacterium with simple sugars, um, that it fixes through photosynthesis. And so, this is a great relationship, where you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours.

NARRATOR: This special process means lupines can grow in even the most inhospitable terrain. The lupine, like the gopher Charlie found earlier, is a pioneering species.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: It's really important in landscapes like Mount St Helens, because the volcanic material that fell on the ground tends to be really nutrient-poor.

NARRATOR: The conditions are difficult, but can the lupine pave the way for other life to follow?

In the spring, geologists also return to the mountain. During the winter months, lava has continued to ooze out of the crater floor.

The lava dome has grown several hundred feet taller and doubled in diameter. It's still a hazardous place.

DAN DZURISIN: When I stepped out of the helicopter, in 1981, on the crater floor, steam was actively rising off the, the growing lava dome. There was still a tremendous amount of noise. Rock falls were constant, and 2,000 feet above your head used to be where the summit of the volcano was. You were now standing in a crater with a lava dome that had not been there a few months previously or a year previously. It was actively steaming. That was a very, very exciting thought.

NARRATOR: It's a rare opportunity to watch the process of dome-building unfold in front of their eyes. The geologists set up instruments to monitor what's going on, including seismometers that can detect tremors set off by lava as it forces its way through the rocks. They place a series of these as close to the lava dome as possible.

At the Cascades Volcano Observatory, in southern Washington, the seismic data pours in.

DAN DZURISIN: A seismic record, like this, records any vibration of the ground, so we can see real rock-breaking earthquakes; we can see rock falls. It's our job to understand what all those signals mean, in terms of what the volcano might do.

NARRATOR: The first traces reflect extreme activity.

DAN DZURISIN: Here, you see the record is almost continuous, one earthquake after the other, bang, bang, bang. The seismic signal is, essentially, continuous.

NARRATOR: The lava is breaking through rocks and flowing across the crater floor.

Then, the seismic record reveals a cyclical pattern.

DAN DZURISIN: For periods of weeks to months, earthquake activity in the crater would be pretty quiet.

NARRATOR: The lava is no longer flowing.

DAN DZURISIN: And then, a few days later, ah, we might see a pattern like this: more and more of these very sharp earthquakes.

NARRATOR: It's the sign of lava on the move again, forcing its way through the ground.

DAN DZURISIN: Eventually, lava would make it onto the surface—maybe in just a couple of days—and we're seeing a continuous record of ground-shaking, both earthquakes and rock falls. Then, after a period of dome growth that might last a few days or a few weeks, it goes quiet again. That episode is ended, and the pattern begins itself over.

NARRATOR: This cycle of dome building continues for the next five years.

The pattern is so regular that when the cycle begins, the scientists can accurately predict what the volcano will do next. When the first rock-breaking earthquakes occur, they know it's only a matter of days or weeks before the lava starts to flow again.

At one point, the dome reaches nearly 1,000 feet, almost as high as the Empire State Building. Then, in late 1986, the seismographs go quiet.

DAN DZURISIN: It was pretty clear that that period of dome building had ended.

NARRATOR: But for how long? Has the mountain gone back to sleep?

JON MAJOR: It wasn't clear whether the mountain had, had gone back to sleep, now, for centuries, or whether it was going to just go back to sleep for a couple of years.

NARRATOR: It seems the pattern has changed. For six years, the scientists have been able to predict what the mountain will do next. Now they are back to guessing if and when it will erupt again.

But even if the volcano has gone to sleep, the wildlife continues to bounce back. More and more gophers are spreading across the blowdown zone; lupines are colonizing the pumice plain; and what's happening at Spirit Lake is remarkable.

The May, 1980, eruption obliterated all visible life in the lake. The surface was smothered in a blanket of debris. In the murky water, there was an explosion of bacteria.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: There were a couple of species of pne..., pneumonia that were described, and also the disease, the bacteria that causes legionnaires disease, legionella. And so, many of us working in the lakes, in the early days, came down with a fever.

NARRATOR: The bacteria rapidly consumed the oxygen, making life impossible for any air-breathing organisms including fish, amphibians and insects.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: We said it's going to be decades and decades before this resembles anything like a typical lake in the Cascade Mountain Range. Well, we were surprised, because that's not exactly what happened.

NARRATOR: Scientists begin routine water sampling. It's a unique opportunity to see if and when life will return from the dead.

At first there's nothing, but as the debris settles, the water clears, light levels improve. Then, three years after the eruption, there's a crucial discovery: microscopic plants. They're phytoplankton, plants that turn sunlight into oxygen.

They've been brought in by birds or blown in by the wind. They are the basic building block of aquatic life.

Over the following months, as light levels continue to improve, the plankton population grows.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: In fact, between 1983 and 1986, 135 different species of these tiny plants had colonized the lake. They provide the oxygen and also the prey for the food web.

NARRATOR: Sunlight, oxygen and food; several years after its complete destruction, Spirit Lake is coming back to life.

Four miles away, the volcano remains quiet. The lava dome has stopped growing. Many geologists think the show is over, at least in their lifetime.

DAN DZURISIN: We had the feeling that we had probably seen our last eruption at Mount St Helens. We knew there was a chance it would erupt again, but none of us were betting on it.

NARRATOR: As the mountain sleeps, wildlife bounces back, even in the most unexpected places. In one of the most devastated areas of the mountain, the pumice plain, a gopher is seen. It's surviving by eating lupine.

Lupines provide the food; gophers enrich the pumice by burrowing their way through the ash. They mix in fresh soil and help new plants to spread.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: When you walked around the landscape, it was those islands created by gopher-turned soils that were very green and full of flower and seeds.

NARRATOR: The gophers also play another role in helping wildlife spread.

Charlie Crisafulli finds a salamander in a gopher's tunnel.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: What's interesting about the gopher is they create kilometers of underground tunnel systems.

NARRATOR: Elk are also returning to the area, helping to expand this amazing web of life.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: When elk move across the landscape, they collapse the tunnels, creating entrance ways that salamanders and other amphibians can get access to. And once they get beneath the ground, these are very cool and moist sites that enable them to survive in an otherwise inhospitable area. And the importance of that is that it allows them to use these underground burrows as stepping stones during hot, dry weather and eventually to colonize new patches of terrestrial habitat, as well as ponds and lakes.

NARRATOR: Spirit Lake now teems with amphibians.

Fish, put into the lake by fishermen, are thriving, a clear indication that the water quality is returning to normal.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: What's happened with the fish was actually remarkable, and, while we don't have a good handle on the total number of fish, we know from our snorkeling and, and our survey that the population is enormous.

NARRATOR: Spirit Lake is beginning to resemble a typical mountain lake. Just over a decade after the eruption, life is flooding back to the slopes of Mount St. Helens. The rate of recovery is far faster than anybody had expected.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: Clearly, our understanding of the ability of these organisms to disperse was greatly underappreciated. We found a lot of our conventional wisdom was just flat wrong.

NARRATOR: Then, as life recovers, new threats emerge.

In September, 2004, the seismographs at the Cascades Volcano Observatory pick up a new series of tremors, deep below Mount St. Helens. The volcano has woken up. John Pallister takes a helicopter to investigate.

JOHN PALLISTER: You could see the absolute beginning of the eruptions, unusual, really unusual, to just happen to be there, in a helicopter, at the crater rim, on the upwind side, so the plume was going away from us.

NARRATOR: Pallister has no idea how big this eruption will be.

JOHN PALLISTER: We saw the boiling material come out of the ground. We saw that it was blasting up. It was dark ash coming out and light steam coming out at the same time. It made a plume that rose up over the rim of the caldera and drifted downwind.

NARRATOR: The speed and suddenness of the eruption catches everybody by surprise.

JON MAJOR: The volcano went from quiet to unrest to eruption very, very rapidly.

NARRATOR: During the next two weeks there are three more eruptions of steam and ash. No one knows what will happen next.

DAN DZURISIN: It seemed possible that we were headed toward an explosive eruption. We didn't know. That was a key question.

NARRATOR: Then, after 14 days, the seismographs quiet down.

Almost as quickly as it started, the eruption stops. But then something strange happens. Over the next few weeks, the seismographs pick up a new pattern of tremors the geologists have never seen before.

Could they be linked to a gigantic lump of lava growing out of the crater floor?

JOHN PALLISTER: It was a huge kind of recumbent spine, this big mass lying in the crater floor some 300 meters, or so, high.

NARRATOR: The spine of lava is as long as the Eiffel Tower.

JON MAJOR: Everybody was just awestruck. To have this large spine just shoving up out of the ground was completely different and outside the experience of any of us here in the staff.

NARRATOR: Despite the risk, John Pallister goes in to take samples.

JOHN PALLISTER: We landed right next to it, and I was able to get out, helicopter helmet on, rapidly run up to the edge of the spine.

NARRATOR: It's an unbelievable sight.

DAN DZURISIN: Had someone suggested to me that we make a movie of a lava dome growing that way, I think I would have said, "It's a little too fantastic, let's make it more realistic."

NARRATOR: At the observatory, where geologists have been puzzling over the strange seismic traces, they now realize what they are: they're the unique autograph of the giant spines as they push their way out of the ground.

DAN DZURISIN: This is the seismic signature of solid blocks of rock, grinding their way through the volcano, coming out onto the surface. As they do, they make these small, seismic signals, one just like the other, just like the other, very repetitive. We came to call them drumbeats.

NARRATOR: The drumbeats continue for several years. Spine after spine of solid lava emerges from the crater floor. It's unlike anything geologists have seen on Mount St. Helens.

JOHN PALLISTER: Now, "spine" doesn't do justice to these things. These things were like skyscrapers that were being shoved out of the ground. They were literally that big.

NARRATOR: Sometimes the blocks grow at a rate of 16 feet a day. Then they collapse. Seen through a time-lapse camera, one solid lump of lava after another pushes up through the crater floor. The process is mystifying. What do the spines mean?

JON MAJOR: Why was the eruption in 2004 so different than the style of eruption in the 1980s? Why, in the 1980s, did you have this more fluid lava that created the sort of short, stubby lava flows that came out and built a lava dome, whereas, in 2004, you basically had solid rock being pushed up in the ground?

NARRATOR: There's one urgent question: is the volcano building up to another major eruption?

JON MAJOR: Trying to make sense of what was going on was a challenge. Trying to understand how the eruption was going to progress was a challenge. We had lots of discussions about whether or not it was going to be an explosive eruption, whether it was going to be another dome-building eruption.

NARRATOR: There is one way to find out. Analyzing samples of the lava might explain the mysterious solid blocks and what they mean for the future. At the volcano observatory, John Pallister compares lava from the spines with samples taken from previous eruptions. Could there be something in their composition that explains why the mountain sometimes pushes up spines, sometimes oozes lava and sometimes explodes?

Pallister begins with a sample of the lava that erupted so explosively in May, 1980. He's immediately struck by the large areas of blue.

JOHN PALLISTER: Okay, so, what's important about this 1980 rock is the abundance of this blue area, and that's, basically, bubbles. That's not a mineral. That's just open space in the thin section. That's where gas bubbles were. This sample would float in water it had so much gas in it.

NARRATOR: The gas comes from water, a component of the magma. As magma rises, changes in pressure turn the water into gas. The gas pressurizes the magma. It's what gives volcanoes their explosive force.

JOHN PALLISTER: 1980 had a lot of gas in it, so it exploded, tore itself apart in a tremendous explosive eruption.

NARRATOR: But, when he looks at lava taken from the 1983 period of dome-building, it's different.

JOHN PALLISTER: There is much less of this open space, of the gas-filling space in the rock.

NARRATOR: The 1983 lava behaves like a bottle of soda going flat.

Finally, he looks at a sample of lava from one of the spines in 2005.

JOHN PALLISTER: I don't see any blue space, any of that. Oh, there's just a little bit, but, dominantly, it is, it is lacking in space. It's a gas-poor magma. In fact, almost none.

NARRATOR: There's just enough gas to push it to the surface, but by the time it gets there, there is nothing left.

JOHN PALLISTER: So this one came up slow, and it made sticky, solidified spines, instead of making either lava flows or an explosive eruption.

NARRATOR: It's a crucial insight: the amount of gas determines the nature of the lava and the force of the eruption.

JOHN PALLISTER: It all comes to the gas budget for the eruption: is it going to fizzle or is it going to explode?

NARRATOR: Suddenly, the mountain's behavior makes sense. The spines are a sign the magma under Mount St. Helens is running low on gas. Then in 2007, as if to confirm this new insight, the familiar drumbeat seismic traces vanish completely. No more spines appear. The lava below the mountain has finally run out of gas.

How long will it take the mountain to build up enough gas pressure for another eruption?

JOHN PALLISTER: I think that is the most important question we have to answer: "How long does it take to build up the gas necessary to drive an explosive eruption?"

NARRATOR: That's now the question they need to answer. Geologists go back to the mountain to look for clues.

The eruption in 1980 took the top off Mount St. Helens, leaving its history exposed in the rock walls of the crater. Most of the important previous eruptions are marked by different colored bands.

JON MAJOR: The lower part of the walls, where you see gray and some yellows and some pinks, are all part of the older edifice of Mount St. Helens.

NARRATOR: These rocks, which make up the bottom half of the rock face, are around 16,000 years old.

JON MAJOR: Then, if you look higher on the wall, near the top, you see darker colors. Those are rocks that began erupting about 3,000 to 2,500 years ago. So, by looking at the, what we call the stratigraphy, in this magnificent exposure of the rock types in the crater walls, we can piece back, uh, sort of, the puzzle and understand the history, as far as...eruptive history of Mount St. Helens.

NARRATOR: Do the rocks give any indication of how long it takes to build up enough gas, between eruptions, for the sleepy mountain to awake again?

John Pallister sorts and categorizes rocks from earlier eruptions. He checks notes and photos to try and determine how often the mountain has erupted violently. Drawing on previous records, he builds up a picture of Mount St. Helens' past. For much of the last 4,000 years, there seems to be a fairly clear pattern.

JOHN PALLISTER: If we look at the number of big eruptions, over the length of time the volcano's been active, you might say that there's one roughly every thousand years, a big eruption. So, um, from our context, here, we could say that it takes on the order of a thousand years to build up enough gas to get a really large eruption.

NARRATOR: The record suggests some of these eruptions have been huge, more than 10 times larger than 1980, potentially enveloping vast areas of Washington and Oregon. But that would imply that the next really big one isn't due for about another century, except for one little detail, around 500 years ago.

JOHN PALLISTER: In 1479, A.D., and 1482, there were two very large eruptions. So the volcano is capable of surprising us and producing two highly explosive eruptions in a span of less than three years.

NARRATOR: Both these eruptions were much bigger than May, 1980. There is no straightforward pattern. Mount St. Helens can pause for a thousand years between big explosive eruptions or it can pause for three.

These results have left geologists with one certainty and a number of questions.

JOHN PALLISTER: First of all, we expect this volcano to erupt again, as repeatedly as in the past. There's no reason to think it's gone to sleep forever, now.

NARRATOR: There will be another eruption, but nobody can determine when or just how big it will be.

JOHN PALLISTER: We don't know whether it's going to erupt explosively again in two years or in 20 years or in 200 years. That is an area that needs a lot more work, a lot more research to understand. And it is of fundamental importance to enable to forecast and to save lives and to save property.

NARRATOR: For 30 years, Mount St. Helens has led scientists on an extraordinary journey of surprise and discovery. When they surveyed the destruction in the early 1980s, nobody could have predicted the speed with which life has returned.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: It was another form of an eruption; it was an eruption of nature. Nature marched back with a vengeance.

NARRATOR: Mount St. Helens has revealed a rich and complex web of life that has never been documented before. Today, the slopes of the mountain are a living testimony to the miraculous ability of nature to return from the dead.

CHARLIE CRISAFULLI: Each time, you would come out here and it, there would be a surprise, something would be unveiled, something that you hadn't seen before. Perhaps it would be a new species of spider, a new species of beetle. Nature is very resilient, and that is the take-home message from 30 years of ecological work on the Mount St. Helens volcano.

NARRATOR: But as nature bounces back, the mountain still broods overhead. It's like a ticking time bomb waiting to destroy life all over again.

JON MAJOR: Based on the history of this volcano, we know it has been extremely active, and it's not a matter of if it will erupt again; it's a matter of when it will erupt again. When will it reactivate? When will it reawaken?

NARRATOR: These are questions scientists are still wrestling with.

DAN DZURISIN: We have yet to find a silver bullet, a magic thing that we can measure that tells us when the volcano is going to turn on.

NARRATOR: Mount St. Helens will erupt again. The only questions are when and how big that eruption will be.

Broadcast Credits

Mt. St. Helens: Back From the Dead

Executive Producer
Matthew Barrett
Written, Produced, and Directed by
Nick Davidson
Associate Producer
Sascha Olofson
Edited by
Martin Sage
Additional Edited by
Rob Alexander
Lance Lewman
Mark Molesworth
Josef Neuper
Additional Photography
Michael Bendixen
Underwater Photography
Erich Pröll
Cineflex Operator
Thomas Miller
Camera Assistants
Martin Stoni
Jutta Wirth
Sound Recordist
Donna Molesworth
Mark Adair
Prime Focus
Location Manager
Sabine Sporer
Unit Manager
Eleonora Frey
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Tag: Martin Luther King Jr.

  • “It’s a very painful situation that we find ourselves in, of looking at where we’ve been and perhaps making the wrong assumption that so much progress has been made, when we see ourselves retreating right back to some of the same behaviors,” said Sweet Honey in the Rock member Nitanju Bolade Casel.

    January 14, 2016 | 0 Comments

  • “We were willing to be beaten for democracy,” says Rev. C.T. Vivian, recalling the freedom movement and voting rights marches from Selma to Montgomery in March 1965. It was, he says, “the beginning of the transformation of America.” More

    March 20, 2015 | 0 Comments

  • “The church had been waking up to the need for race reform in the post-war era,” says Georgia State University history professor Glenn Eskew. “The change had been slow among the establishment within the churches from the top down, but from the seminarians, the young people from the bottom up—they embraced the movement. They embraced the idea of racial change.” More

    March 20, 2015 | 0 Comments

  • As the movie opens today (January 9) in theaters around the country amidst controversy over its portrayal of former president Lyndon Johnson, we speak with director Ava DuVernay and David Oyelowo, the actor who portrays Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., about what it means to them to tell the story of the historic 1965 civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. More

    January 9, 2015 | Comments (2)

  • Edward Snowden “would be truer to what is morally at stake in his actions and to the highest tradition of civil disobedience if he came home to face the consequences.” More

    February 19, 2014 | Comments (9)

  • “Peace requires that we nurture each other…you have to live with this community ethic where you recognize…that we are deeply interconnected,” says Rev. Otis Moss III, senior pastor at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. More

    December 20, 2013 | Comments (2)

  • View Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly’s archive of stories about Martin Luther King, Jr. and his legacy. More

    November 27, 2013 | 0 Comments

  • The civil rights movement was both “the work of the Lord and the work of freedom,” says author Taylor Branch. “It took redemption, and it took faith and tenacity, not just an empty, simple hope.” More

    November 27, 2013 | Comments (7)

  • Recent events such as the shooting death of Trayvon Martin and the subsequent trial of George Zimmerman have highlighted racial divides that still exist in the U.S. 50 years after the historic March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. In the wake of the shooting, local black and white pastors in Sanford, Florida are taking a hard look at what more they can do to promote dialogue, understanding, and racial reconciliation. More

    August 23, 2013 | Comments (5)

  • “We need to remember that the anniversary of the March on Washington is not the anniversary of a speech, but the anniversary of a very important point in history to expand democracy, to deepen democracy, and to make democracy more faithful to its own sayings.” More

    August 23, 2013 | 0 Comments

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Connection Clearance Center. Shop Now!

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          Linksys Max Stream ac1200 MU-MIMO USB WiFi Adapter

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          Instantly upgrade your Windows-based laptop, MacBook, or desktop computer to the latest Wi-Fi standard with the Linksys MAX-STREAM AC1200 MU-MIMO Wireless USB Adapter. This adapter lets your PC connect to high-speed AC Wi-Fi, giving you the speed and performance necessary for media streaming, online gaming, and other high-bandwidth activities. You'll be able to stream, game, and surf without experiencing lag or buffering.
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Sanyo PDG-DSU20 Not yet reviewed.

Sanyo PDG-DSU20

  • Bottom Line

    Not yet reviewed.

Editor's Note: Product not yet tested. The following description is from the manufacturer.

The value-priced SANYO PDG-DSU20 is designed primarily for classrooms, boardrooms and other small gatherings. This ultra-portable projector, weighing in at 6 pounds offers SVGA (800 X 600) resolution with a brightness of 2000 lumens. It also has a built-in 2-watt speaker.

For additional information on Projectors and product reviews, please visit our Projectors product guide.

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ipad event march 7

Apple has sent out invitations for an event widely believed to be the launch party for its next-generation iPad—but could the March 7 date also mark the unveiling of a new Apple TV?

That's what 9to5Mac was reporting Tuesday as the buzz around Apple's first big hardware launch of 2012 began to burn up the wires.

"We have something you really have to see. And touch," the invitation read. Those ten words appeared to confirm the recent reports of a March 7 unveiling of the so-called iPad 3 at San Francisco's Yerba Buena Center for the Arts next Wednesday at 10 am. The venue has been used by Apple for several major product launches in the past few years.

But speculation about Apple's next attempt to penetrate the lucrative television market has also been rampant, particularly since a biography of Steve Jobs revealed that the late Apple co-founder believed the company had finally "cracked" the secret of television.

Citing "[r]eliable sources familiar with Apple's upcoming product release," 9to5Mac reported that the company will announce a new Apple TV that's internally code named J33 at the same March 7 event where it will unveil its next-gen tablet.

Previous rumors have pointed to the new Apple TV being full-blown television set, unlike the set-top boxes Apple currently sells under the Apple TV brand. The "J33" product supposedly sports a variation of Apple's dual-core, ARM-based A5 processor that can stream 1080p video, according to the tech blog.

There's been plenty more speculation about Apple's next TV product. One of the most pervasive rumors—made all the more interesting in light of 9to5Mac's reporting—is that the iPad and possibly other iOS-based devices will function as remote controls for the TV set.

The Apple TV picture started coming into focus over the past few weeks with several reports about potential retail and carrier partners gearing up for the launch of a next-generation HD television set that runs iOS, incorporates the Siri digital voice assistant, and could retail for about $1,500 in the United States.

Turn On, Tune In to Apple TV

The Verge reported in early February that Best Buy sent out a customer survey that includes a question about an "all-new 42-inch Apple HDTV" priced at $1,499 that sports a 1080p LED flat panel display, works with iPhones and iPads functioning as remote controls, and connects to Apple's iCloud, iTunes, and App Store marketplaces.

A few days later, The Globe and Mail reported that Canadian carriers Rogers Communications and Bell Canada are vying to partner with Apple if and when the rumored television set is launched north of the border. Canada's two largest telecommunications companies reportedly have the new Apple TV in their labs for testing.

The Globe and Mail report added some details to what Apple may be building into its highly anticipated TV set. The new Apple TV will integrate Siri, which debuted with the iPhone 4S last year, according to the paper's sources.

That means that users would be able to control the next-gen Apple TV via voice, according to the newspaper—and also, intriguingly, through hand gestures, which indicates that Apple could be building new Kinect-type technology for the television set.

While Apple itself has characteristically kept its future television plans tightly under wraps, evidence is certainly piling up that something is in the offing.

In December, it was reported that Apple was revving up its supply chain in order to deliver components for next-generation television products due out in the second or third quarter of 2012.

What's more, South Korean media reported late last year that Samsung began producing chips for next-generation Apple TVs back in November, while Sharp is reportedly supplying the displays for the units.

But the reports from Asia indicated that Apple was planning a 32-inch version and a 37-inch version of the rumored Apple TV set, not the larger model that's teased in the Best Buy survey.

PCMag will be at the March 7 Apple event, so stay tuned for all the details.

For more, see Report: Next Apple TV to Use Siri, Kinect-Type Interface, Steve Jobs 'Cracked' the Secret to an Apple TV Set Before He Died, Why You Should Wait to Buy the Next iPad, and an iPad 3 rumor roundup, plus the slideshow below.

Leslie Horn contributed to this report.

For the top stories in tech, follow us on Twitter at @PCMag.


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Mobile phone voltmeter VoltOTG

$30.50 $15.00

Manufacturer: PCsensor

Stock Level: 995

Product Information

VoltOTG is a DC voltage meter, it is an Android mobile phone voltage meter which based on the USB OTG interface , through the matching adapter it can also be connected to the computer USB port.VoltOTG probe to the USB is not any isolated, so it is not recommended to measure high voltage.
The matching Android mobile phone software can see the measured signal waveform,with data saved to the file and other functions.

Note: Android mobile phone must support the OTG function then it can be used

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Ascent of Davidson County High Point on 2007-08-02

Climber: Braxton Oeser

Date:Thursday, August 2, 2007
Ascent Type:Successful Summit Attained
Peak:Davidson County High Point
    Elevation:1160 ft / 353 m
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text:
Ascent of Mount Willey on 2004-03-07

Climber: Mick Dunn

Date:Sunday, March 7, 2004
Ascent Type:Successful Summit Attained
Peak:Mount Willey
    Location:USA-New Hampshire
    Elevation:4255 ft / 1296 m
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Rhode Island County Prominence Peaks

RankCountyPeak Prom-Ft  Elev-Ft Range (Level 5)HPAscent Date
1.ProvidenceBeacon Pole Hill300550Southern New England Upland
2.NewportQuaker Hill280280Southern New England Upland
3.KentEscoheag Hill220560Southern New England Upland
4.WashingtonBeacon Hill211211Northeast Islands/Cape Cod
5.BristolMount Hope207217Southern New England UplandHP

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jim lee view gallery

Award winning technology executive with demonstrated success directing business and technology transformations in global organizations. Seeking opportunities to work in an environment requiring restructuring a dysfunctional or inefficient IT organization and bring best practices into execution and delivery of innovative solutions. A leader who has high emotional quotient and understands the dynamics of motivating, directing and most importantly developing a connection with team members. Winner of 2010 & 2011 Information Week 500 Award for business technology innovation and execution; A.M. Best E-Fusion Award for innovation and business focused use of technology in 2007; and led IT for a business unit that received J.D. Power and Associates Certification for providing “An outstanding Customer Service Experience” in 2008. Specialties Asset Management – Insurance Sector – Organizational Transformations – Outsourcing – Cost Containment – Internet Banking – Project Management – Management Consultant – Strategy – Process Re-engineering – Risk Management – Application Development Lifecycle


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Amazon kindle B&N Audible

Chapter One

With Mr. Darcy’s letter in hand, Elizabeth wandered along the lane for two hours. How could it be that only this morning, she had been so certain of her convictions that Mr. Darcy wronged both her sister Jane and Mr. Wickham? She could hardly reconcile herself to the intelligence in the letter, proving Mr. Darcy a victim rather than a villain. At last fatigue, and a recollection of her long absence, made her return home; and she entered the house with the wish of appearing cheerful as usual.

She was immediately told that Colonel Fitzwilliam had called during her absence, and had been sitting with the ladies for over an hour awaiting her return. Her agitating reflections did not stand her in good stead for civil conversation, yet she assured herself that he was only hoping to take leave of her, since he and Mr. Darcy were to depart the following morning. She endeavoured to compose herself, and with a deep breath she entered the sitting room with a charming, if somewhat unsteady, smile.

“Miss Bennet!” cried Colonel Fitzwilliam. “I had just resolved to walk after you, and here you are!”

“My apologies that I was not here to receive you, sir,” she said with a curtsey. “I fear that I lost all track of time in my rambling.”

“It is hardly a matter of concern, Miss Bennet,” he replied amiably. “I have been enjoying a delightful visit with Mrs. Collins and Miss Lucas, and, as it happens, I anticipate having the unexpected opportunity to take pleasure in your company in the days to come.”

At Elizabeth’s look of confusion, Maria Lucas said, “It appears that Colonel Fitzwilliam is not to depart tomorrow as anticipated, Lizzy! Is that not delightful news?”

“Delightful indeed,” echoed Elizabeth stiffly as a worrisome implication came to her mind. She longed to ask the reason for the change of plans, but feared to know it; she recalled only too clearly their discourse of the previous day when he had said that they were to leave on Saturday unless Darcy put it off again. Surely Mr. Darcy would wish to be quit of this place as soon as possible! she thought in distress. He cannot possibly think to renew his addresses-no, his letter said that he could not forget his feelings for me quickly enough! She awaited with dread his further explanation.

“Well, it is quite true! An express arrived last night from my father, announcing that he and my mother will be descending upon Rosings later today, accompanied by Miss Darcy. Since it would be the height of bad manners for us to depart before they arrive,” he smiled engagingly at his own wit, “here we must remain.”

Elizabeth’s heart sank even further at this intelligence. She tried to rally her spirits by reminding herself that Lady Catherine would certainly have no interest in the company of Mr. and Mrs. Collins with so much of her family at Rosings.

Surely he and I can manage to avoid one another for a week, and then I shall be for London myself, she thought. “So Mr. Darcy will be remaining as well,” she said as steadily as she could manage.

“Yes, of course,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam, “though he is in quite an ill humour about it; I believe that he was looking forward to his return to town. When he heard the news this morning, he looked quite as annoyed as I have ever seen him!”

I can only imagine! thought Elizabeth. I doubt he could be rid of me soon enough!

Words were insufficient for the elevation of Mr. Collins’ feelings on receiving the intelligence that no lesser personages than Lord and Lady Matlock themselves were to appear at Rosings. He resolved immediately to be within view of the lodges opening into Hunsford Lane for the entirety of the day, lest he miss the opportunity to make his first obeisance to the honoured guests. After relating at some length the extra effort which he would put into his Sunday sermon for the benefit of the elevated company, he hastened to Rosings to call on her Ladyship, hoping for the condescension of receiving further news of the visit from her own lips.

Charlotte attempted to engage Elizabeth in conversation, but the latter felt unequal to the circumstance, and begged leave to retire to her room owing to a headache. Concerned that her friend’s ailment of the previous day seemed to have returned, Charlotte suggested sending for the apothecary, but Elizabeth demurred, saying that rest would be all she would require. “If you are still ill tomorrow, Lizzy, I shall insist!” said Charlotte.

Elizabeth was grateful to retire to the peace of her room, but her mind would not long remain still. She took out Mr. Darcy’s letter once more and perused it several times, struggling to collect her thoughts. The information in his letter had been distressing enough when she thought she should never see him again, and it was all the more so for the knowledge that they would likely meet at least in passing in the coming week. I must behave with absolute propriety and circumspection, she resolved. For both our sakes, no one must guess what has passed between us! She speculated whether anyone might know already – could Mr. Darcy have confided in Colonel Fitzwilliam, or had anyone apart from Charlotte noted his interest in her?

She wondered briefly if she ought to acknowledge to him in any way that she recognized that she had misjudged and falsely accused him. He would no doubt find it gratifying, but the risk that he might believe that she was inviting a renewal of his addresses could not be justified. She would have to keep her thoughts to herself, and live with the injustice of the matter.

The following day Colonel Fitzwilliam put in his usual appearance at the parsonage, accompanied this time by Miss Darcy. He begged of the ladies the opportunity to introduce them, and Elizabeth, although hardly interested in becoming an intimate of anyone in the Darcy family, could not help feeling a deep curiosity as to the nature of this young woman of whom she had heard such differing descriptions. Mr. Wickham had told her that Miss Darcy was very proud; but the observation of a very few minutes convinced her that she was only exceedingly shy. She found it difficult to obtain even a word from her beyond a monosyllable.

Miss Darcy was tall, and on a larger scale than Elizabeth; and, though little more than sixteen, her figure was formed, and her appearance womanly and graceful. She was less handsome than her brother, but there was sense and goodhumour in her face, and her manners were perfectly unassuming and gentle. Elizabeth, who had expected to find in her as acute and unembarrassed an observer as ever Mr. Darcy had been, was much relieved by discerning such different feelings. Had her situation been different, she thought that she might even have found pleasure in Miss Darcy’s acquaintance, but, as it stood, she could not imagine any connection with the Darcy family that would not create difficulties.

She attempted to encourage interaction between Miss Darcy and Maria Lucas, since they were much of an age, but since Maria was so in awe of Miss Darcy that she could scarcely utter a word, the encounter was somewhat less than successful. Elizabeth found herself conversing mainly with Colonel Fitzwilliam, whose easy manners covered some of the other difficulties. From time to time she succeeded in drawing Miss Darcy into the conversation for a few minutes, but on the whole she could not consider the occasion a success. If only Mr. Darcy were here as well, she thought with frustrated amusement, we could have three silent participants instead of only two! She wondered briefly how there could possibly be any conversation at all at the Darcy dinner table, then recalled that both Colonel Fitzwilliam and Mr. Wickham had mentioned that Mr. Darcy could be quite lively and amiable amongst those he considered his equals. But I will never be the one to observe such a thing, she thought, recalling with anger his vivid recounting of his attempts to suppress his unsuitable feelings for her. She wondered if he knew where his sister was at this moment, and what he thought of it.

She breathed a sigh of relief when the visitors took their leave. Maria Lucas chattered on for some time about the elegance of Miss Darcy, but Elizabeth was scarcely listening; her thoughts had returned to Mr. Darcy’s pointed description of her family and her connections, and she could find little consolation for her shaken spirits.

The following morning Elizabeth dressed for church slowly but with unusual care; her desire to avoid the occasion completely was great, but she knew that her absence would be noted, and that she could not plead a headache forever. Surely we can meet for the brief time needed at church as indifferent acquaintances, she thought, but her anxiety would not be quieted.

She was still far from certain of what she thought of Mr. Darcy. His letter, she was in a fair way of knowing by heart. She had studied every sentence: and her feelings towards its writer were at times widely different. When she remembered the style of his address, she was still full of indignation; but when she considered how unjustly she had condemned and upbraided him, her anger was turned against herself; and his disappointed feelings became the object of compassion. His attachment excited gratitude, his general character respect; but she could not approve him; nor could she for a moment repent her refusal, or feel the slightest inclination to continue the acquaintance. In her own past behaviour, there was a constant source of vexation and regret; and in the unhappy defects of her family a subject of yet heavier chagrin. They were hopeless of remedy. Her father, contented with laughing at them, would never exert himself to restrain the wild giddiness of his youngest daughters; and her mother, with manners so far from right herself, was entirely insensible of the evil. Elizabeth had frequently united with Jane in an endeavour to check the imprudence of Catherine and Lydia; but while they were supported by their mother’s indulgence, what chance could there be of improvement? Catherine, weak-spirited, irritable, and completely under Lydia’s guidance, had been always affronted by their advice; and Lydia, self-willed and careless, would scarcely give them a hearing. They were ignorant, idle, and vain. While there was an officer in Meryton, they would flirt with him; and while Meryton was within a walk of Longbourn, they would be going there for ever.

She was no less severe on her own defects. She was mortified by having been taken in by Wickham’s amiable manners. For the first time, she was grateful to have no fortune of her own – if she had, she should have been in extreme danger from Mr. Wickham, and likely would have found herself married to him before discovering him to be a dishonest wastrel. She could not bear the humiliating notion that Darcy knew this of her – he might forgive the fault in his sister, who was only fifteen, but she had no such excuse of tender age for her folly.

Anxiety on Jane’s behalf was another prevailing concern, and Mr. Darcy’s explanation, by restoring Bingley to all her former good opinion, heightened the sense of what Jane had lost. His affection was proved to have been sincere, and his conduct cleared of all blame, unless any could attach to the implicitness of his confidence in his friend. How grievous then was the thought that, of a situation so desirable in every respect, so replete with advantage, so promising for happiness, Jane had been deprived, by the folly and indecorum of her own family!

When to these recollections was added the development of Wickham’s character, it may be easily believed that the happy spirits which had seldom been depressed before, were now so much affected as to make it almost impossible for her to appear tolerably cheerful.

She was mortified at the prospect of having to see Darcy – he who knew just how much of a gullible fool she had been. She had thought so highly of her own perspicacity, and now she knew herself to be quite lacking in that regard. Not only had she been wholly taken in by Wickham and predisposed to find reasons to dislike Darcy, she had also completely failed to observe any sign of his increasing attachment to her in time to circumvent the disaster of his proposal. When she looked back, those signs were obvious – his asking her to dance at the Netherfield ball when he danced with no other lady from Hertfordshire; his frequent, seemingly accidental, meetings with her, joining with her on walks when he easily could have excused himself; their very frank and slightly improper discussion of the nature of the Collins’ marriage, which had to her represented nothing more than her very strong sentiments on the subject, but the very intimacy of which could easily have been interpreted as a sign of her regard for him. Of course, it was true that she did have a certain regard for his incisive intelligence, otherwise she would never have entered on the subject. Oh, how had she missed it? Even Charlotte had noticed, and tried to warn her of it, but she had been blind, so blind…

“Cousin Elizabeth!” came the voice of Mr. Collins. “We shall be late! Make haste, make haste!”

With a sigh, Elizabeth went downstairs and practiced on Mr. and Mrs. Collins the bright smile she was intending to wear in church. Charlotte gave her a sharp glance, but interpreted her artificial behaviour as a response to the scurrying of Mr. Collins.

“Cousin Elizabeth,” Mr. Collins scolded. “Lady Catherine is quite firm on the subject of the desirability of promptness. Any tardiness on our part would be looked on with great disapproval, and hardly show respect for the condescension she had demonstrated toward you!”

Fleetingly, Elizabeth wondered how Lady Catherine would have responded to Elizabeth being presented to her as her future niece. She could not think, without a smile, of what her ladyship’s indignation would have been, but the smile engendered by this idea was rapidly smothered by the recollection of Darcy’s words on the degradation his attachment to her represented. She felt ill as she thought on the folly and indecorum of her own family and how it reflected on her, and how materially it had affected both her and Jane.

She reminded herself firmly that Darcy’s behaviour was as ill-bred as that of anyone in her family, though excessive pride could not be interpreted to be as humiliating a fault as the ignorance and complete lack of decorum of Lydia and Kitty or the stupidity of Mr. Collins. But the style of his address during his proposal, and indeed throughout their acquaintance, deserved censure. No, that was not quite true either, her sense of fairness forced her to admit. He had been insulting and excessively proud on some occasions, but in most of their meetings she had nothing worse to accuse him of than being overly quiet. Yet another failure on my part, she thought.

Mr. Collins was voluble in his relief when they discovered that the Rosings party had not yet arrived at the church, and he hurried off to prepare himself for the service, leaving Charlotte to fend for herself in greeting the parishioners. Elizabeth, equally relieved although for quite a different reason, found her heart pounding each time she heard a carriage pull up outside.

She had not long to wait; soon Lady Catherine swept in, her party following in her wake. She was prompt in demanding her share of the conversation, introducing the ladies to Lord and Lady Matlock – “Mrs. Collins, and Miss Bennet and Miss Lucas, visiting from Hertfordshire,’ she said in a dismissive voice.

Elizabeth politely expressed her pleasure in making the acquaintance. When it came time for her to greet the rest of the party, she found that she could not bring herself to look directly at Darcy; she made her curtsey with her eyes firmly fixed on his cravat, and she knew that her cheeks must be flushed. She managed to keep her polite smile on her face, however, and was able to greet Colonel Fitzwilliam and Miss Darcy with tolerable composure.

There were several minutes before the service was to begin, and Elizabeth was for the first time grateful for Lady Catherine’s propensity to dominate the conversation, as it relieved her of the burden of finding something to say. As she attended to her ladyship, though, she began to despise herself for her cowardice. She forced her eyes up to Darcy’s face, only to meet his implacably cold gaze.

That she had expected scorn and anger did not lessen the distress Elizabeth felt on seeing it on his face. She held his gaze only briefly before taking the excuse of Lady Catherine’s ongoing discourse to look away. She thought of how he had said that his good opinion, once lost, was lost forever. How he must be congratulating himself for his near escape from a woman of so little perception and judgment! she thought, humbled by her fall from grace, surprised that the thought of his disapproval troubled her.

When she chanced to raise her eyes to his face again, unable to resist the painful impulse of curiosity, she found him looking on no object but the ground. It was with the greatest of relief that she heard Lady Catherine pronounce that it was time for the service to begin.

Elizabeth was grateful that she was seated behind Mr. Darcy, where she need not fear his incisive gaze. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you. How he must regret those words, those sentiments which had led to his harsh and unfair castigation at her hands! In addition to blindness and prejudice, she was also obliged to claim cruelty and short-temperedness among her many faults.

Her eyes drifted to him – the tousled dark curls against the brilliant white of his cravat as he sat proudly upright in the pew. She could not deny that he was handsome; she had acknowledged that even at the Meryton assembly when she first saw him. It was only his insulting behaviour and forbidding countenance on that occasion that had led her to disregard the appeal of his appearance. But good looks and a good fortune could not by themselves determine a good husband. In vain have I struggled. It will not do. Although she wished she had dealt differently with his proposal, when she thought of his humiliating references to how greatly he had striven to rid himself of his feelings for her, she could not bring herself to regret her decision. An image came to her of his intent gaze as it had so often rested on her, and unaccountably she shivered, wondering at his thoughts on seeing her again.

The object of her thoughts was at that moment brooding on the question of whether his life could possibly become any worse. He could not help being viscerally aware of Elizabeth’s presence any more than he ever had been, only now it was like an ache in his breast rather than the guilty pleasure it had so often been in the past. If that were not enough, he had to suffer through the sycophantic ramblings that her idiot of a cousin considered a sermon – a reminder of just how low he had sunk in offering her marriage. And then there was his family… but he was not even going to think about that now.

He had spent the last two days struggling to convince himself that the Elizabeth Bennet he had loved was a figment of his imagination; he had never known the real Elizabeth Bennet at all, she of the cruel and spiteful words and the misjudgments. She was as misguided and capricious as all the other women he had known. He had taken her fine eyes and wit and spun them into a fantasy of a woman of real sense and feeling who would understand him, and now he knew that no such woman had ever existed. He was mortified for himself and furious with her, and the worst of it was that the instant he had laid eyes on her again, standing in front of the church, he had wanted her every bit as much as he ever had. He hated her for her power over him, and despised himself for a weak fool.

As attuned to her presence as he was, he could not fail to notice that she was lacking her usual sparkle that morning. He hoped that this meant that she had realized what a dreadful mistake she had made, and that she was going to pay for the rest of her life for listening to George Wickham’s lies and then spewing her venom all over Fitzwilliam Darcy. She would end up a poor spinster, dependent on the charity of her family, or married to some ignorant pig of a tradesman, she who could have been Mistress of Pemberley. If she is suffering now, it is no more than she deserves, he thought with vindictive fury, then closed his eyes in pain, knowing that all he had wanted when he had seen those dark circles beneath her eyes was to take her soft body into his arms and kiss those tempting lips, and to tell her that she need not worry, that he would take care of everything…

But fantasies would not provide him any answers, he told himself grimly. And if his uncle said to him one more time, “It would be different if you were married and settled, but with a bachelor lifestyle, it simply will not do,” he would not be responsible for his actions. He could ignore Lady Catherine’s repeated demands that he marry Anne immediately; he had a lifetime of practice at that, but to face the accusation that it was his fault that he was not married just at this bitter juncture was more than a man should have to bear. He realized that his fists were clenched, and that he had not heard a word that Elizabeth’s embarrassment of a kinsman had servilely uttered – not that it was any loss.

He could see that Georgiana was looking at him strangely. He took a deep breath to calm himself and forced a pleasant smile to his face, at which point she resumed the sullen expression that she had worn ever since her arrival, a reminder of her obvious disappointment with him for his inability to make all her problems disappear. What had happened to the sweet, docile girl she had been? Sometimes he could still see that girl, but more often these days she seemed angry with him about one thing or another. Colonel Fitzwilliam thought it was but a matter of her being at a trying age, but Darcy could not help suspecting that the whole George Wickham affair had something to do with it. Georgiana could not know, of course, how harshly he continued to castigate himself for his error in choosing Mrs. Younge as her companion. The thought brought back the all too familiar refrain of reproaches: Why did I not question her references further? Why did I allow myself to believe that her amiable manner implied impeccable morals? Why did I send Georgiana off with her so quickly, instead of keeping her under my observation for a longer period of time? Why did I give in and agree to let Georgiana have her own establishment in the first place when she was still so young? The entire situation was wholly my fault. No, on the whole, Darcy did not think that his life could be substantially worse.

He was forced to reconsider this a few minutes later when he heard his aunt issue an invitation to Mr. Collins and his party to come to Rosings that evening. He ought to have expected as much; she had done so the previous two Sundays as well, but he had thought that with so much of her family around her, her interest in having her pet clergyman fawn over her would be diminished. Apparently he was to have no such reprieve, and he was beginning to think of the excuses he could make when he saw Elizabeth turn her head away in an attempt to hide her distress at the idea, and he knew that he would not be able to stay away. He damned himself for his susceptibility to her. Remember, she thinks you devoid of every proper feeling and completely lacking in honour, he reminded himself. She is nothing but a silly girl who would throw away an opportunity most women spend their lives dreaming of because she was offended by your honest scruples. With a stab of pain, he heard her voice again saying, “You are mistaken, Mr. Darcy, if you suppose that the mode of your declaration affected me in any other way, than as it spared me the concern which I might have felt in refusing you, had you behaved in a more gentleman-like manner.”

What spiteful fate had determined that the woman he loved should be the one woman in the world who wanted nothing to do with him? He wondered whether such a turn of events constituted a tragedy or a farce. He managed the semblance of a civil nod to Elizabeth and the rest of her party before forcing his feet to carry him away from the woman who had so bewitched him.

Elizabeth felt quite unequal to company following the painful excursion to church, and knowing that she would be required to face an even more excruciating version of the same torture that evening, resolved to take some time to herself for reflection in her favourite manner. She therefore excused herself for a solitary walk after luncheon, brushing aside Charlotte’s protests regarding her pallor and recent headaches. Sooner or later, she knew, she would have to face her friend’s growing suspicions that all was not well with her, but she could not begin to face that task at present.

Her feet led her without conscious thought to her favourite grove. On recognizing where she was, she felt a moment of panic, knowing now that it was where Darcy had often sought her out in the past. She realized, though, that she was quite safe, as there would be no place that he would more fervently avoid at present. He had, after all, made the state of his current regard for her more than clear, that his feelings were cause for shame, and could not be forgotten too soon. His cold look in church demonstrated that he had lost no time in putting those tender feelings behind him. She could not blame him; she certainly deserved no special notice after she had abused him so abominably.

Her sense of shame over her behaviour led directly to thoughts of the unhappy defects of her family, the subject of yet heavier chagrin. She burst into tears as she thought of it, and from actual weakness leaned against a tree as she wept. She had always avoided acknowledging the extent to which the lack of fortune of the Bennet girls combined with their mother’s improprieties materially affected their prospects for marriage; it was easy enough to say that she should not marry where she did not love, but Mr. Darcy’s words were forcing her to face the truth that even the beautiful, gentle Jane had only had the one suitor when she was sixteen before Mr. Bingley, and Elizabeth’s assets were certainly no greater than her sister’s.

She was sufficiently deep in her own distress as to be unaware of approaching footsteps. Darcy stopped short at the sight of her across the grove, immediately thinking to leave before he was observed. At the realization that she was weeping, however, he was torn by uncertainty. He could not be sure of the cause of her distress, but it could be assumed to relate to his disastrous proposal. A part of him longed to go to her and comfort her, while at the same time it felt only proper that she ought to suffer as he did. Nor could he expect her to welcome his attempts to relieve her distress – she had made it perfectly clear what she thought of him, and he would be the last man she would wish to offer her solace. With an unfamiliar sensation of helplessness, he realized that there was nothing he could offer her for her present distress. The question in his mind, however, was as to why she was upset. He was the rejected suitor, he was the one misjudged and falsely accused. The answer was not long in coming; with a bitter taste in his mouth, he realized that her tears had nothing to do with him at all, but must represent the pain of her disillusionment over Wickham. Her feelings for him must have been more tender than Darcy had ever considered, and a surge of hatred rose in him. Was it not enough that Wickham had injured his beloved sister, without taking away the woman he loved as well?

“Do you think that any consideration would tempt me to accept the man, who has been the means of ruining, perhaps forever, the happiness of a most beloved sister?” Could it be possible that Elizabeth despised him as he did Wickham, for the hurt willfully done a beloved sister? The thought that his actions could be seen in such a light was acutely disturbing, the more so because he could not even defend himself against the charge. Whatever his motives, concern for the feelings of Jane Bennet had never entered his head, only the advantages he perceived for Bingley and for himself in their separation.

His heart aching, he turned and retreated as quietly as possible to reflect upon his painful realizations – his Elizabeth, so deeply involved with Wickham as to be devastated by his revelations about her favourite, and her right to despise him as being no better than Wickham himself. How was he ever to face her? How was he to live with the knowledge that she would never be his?

Elizabeth knew that it was hopeless to think that she could appear even tolerably cheerful at Rosings that night, and had settled it with herself that merely maintaining her composure would be enough of a goal. That she was quieter than usual was not immediately a problem; Lady Catherine was perfectly capable of handling the conversation without input from anyone, and it appeared that this was a tendency that Lord Matlock shared with his sister.

Darcy gave no visible reaction to her arrival, though she noticed that he quickly abandoned his seat opposite her to walk behind her where she could not see him. She could feel, however, the pressure of his gaze on the back of her neck, and she remained acutely conscious of his presence, all the more so after Lady Catherine said irritably, “Darcy, will you stop that pacing? You are making me quite dizzy!”

Darcy obeyed his aunt’s command somewhat ungraciously, feeling that pacing was a substantial improvement over the other possibilities that came to his mind, both of which involved taking bodily hold of Elizabeth Bennet, though whether to shake her or to kiss her he was not quite clear. He ignored her further directives to sit down immediately by Anne.

Darcy being insufficiently responsive to her demands, Lady Catherine’s vexation grew, and as her eye fell on Elizabeth, she turned to this new target. “Miss Elizabeth Bennet, you are very quiet tonight!” exclaimed her Ladyship. “No more of your decided opinions for you?”

Aware of the gentleman behind her and the wrong she had done him, Elizabeth seized the opportunity to make a sort of apology. In as composed a manner as she could manage, she replied, “Your ladyship has brought to my attention that there is a danger in owning decided opinions. I have realized that there is the risk that one might hold them on the basis of false information, which could lead to regrettable circumstances.”

Lady Catherine was undecided as to whether this response qualified as impertinence or appropriate humility, but decided that it must represent the latter. “I am glad to know that my advice did not go unheeded, Miss Bennet, and to hear that you are not above taking the counsel of your betters in these matters.”

Darcy, who had been frozen in place by Elizabeth’s unexpected admission, winced at his aunt’s ill-bred words. Was that how he sounded to Elizabeth?

Lady Catherine’s attention now shifted to Miss Darcy. “Georgiana, your brother has given me excellent reports on your progress at the pianoforte. I should be pleased to hear you play now.”

Georgiana paled. “Please excuse me, Lady Catherine, I could not possibly play before all these people,” she said.

Her aunt frowned at this disobedience. “Nonsense, Georgiana. You play quite acceptably, though perhaps not quite so well as my Anne would have had she had the chance to learn. I must insist that you play for us.”

“I beg you to excuse me,” the girl said in a voice barely above a whisper.

“I will not have this, Georgiana! You are my niece, and I refuse to believe you unable to perform before a small family party!” Lady Catherine’s annoyance with her niece’s stubbornness was clearly growing rapidly.

Elizabeth had never seen Lady Catherine in a mood quite as vindictive as tonight, and her heart went out to Miss Darcy, who was clearly petrified. She could not even bring herself to answer, and tears were beginning to gather in her eyes. Elizabeth was relieved to see Darcy move to stand beside his sister’s chair, his hand resting comfortingly on her shoulder. “If Georgiana does not wish to play,” he said deliberately, “I see no reason why she should have to do so.”

“Now, see here, Darcy,” rumbled Lord Matlock. “You are mollycoddling her again. That is no way to help her!”

Darcy’s jaw was set in clear lines of anger. Elizabeth could not understand the precise nature of the problem at hand, but she could see that Miss Darcy was on the verge of losing her composure completely.

With sudden resolve, Elizabeth fixed her eyes firmly on Darcy, willing him to look her way. As if drawn by a magnet, his gaze turned to her. She gestured slightly with her head toward the piano forte. He watched her unreadably for a moment, then said, as if unwillingly, “In fact, I had been looking forward to hearing Miss Bennet play tonight.”

“As have I,” added Colonel Fitzwilliam quickly.

Elizabeth stood before any objection could be raised. “It would be my pleasure. Miss Darcy, might I impose upon you to turn the pages for me?”

Miss Darcy agreed to this idea with embarrassing alacrity, escaping in Elizabeth’s shadow to the pianoforte. As they sat down to the instrument, Elizabeth began paging through the sheet music. “Thank you,” said Georgiana softly.

Elizabeth turned to her with a smile. “You are quite welcome. I hope that you do not pay overmuch attention to what was said,” she said quietly.

“What do you mean, Miss Bennet?” she asked shyly.

Placing her fingers on the keyboard, Elizabeth said mischievously, “I daresay that you will hear criticisms of my playing tonight, but I would have to play a great deal worse than I do in order to be as ashamed of my playing as I would be of being so ill-mannered.”

Colonel Fitzwilliam drew a chair near them, putting an end to their conversation, but the interchange had not gone unnoticed by Darcy. Although unable to make out their words, he could see Georgiana’s look of surprise and admiration, and he wondered what Elizabeth had said to her. Before her playing could begin to cast its usual spell on him, he looked straight at her to remind himself of the accusations she had made, and the familiar rush of anger at her willful misunderstanding of his nature filled him once again.

Lady Catherine, misinterpreting the look of distaste on his face and quite prepared to criticize anything about her nephew, said, “Miss Bennet plays none too ill for one who has not had the advantage of a London master. One could hardly expect her to meet the standards to which you are accustomed, Darcy, nor to have taste equal to Anne’s or Georgiana’s. If she would only practice more, I believe that she would be a pleasant performer.”

Elizabeth inclined her head toward Miss Darcy. “It begins already, you see,” she whispered, amusement in her voice. “Now, I urge you to ask yourself, which of us has cause to be embarrassed.”

Georgiana giggled, her admiration of Elizabeth nearing adulation as she continued to receive Lady Catherine’s remarks with forbearance, but not without quiet commentary of her own. Elizabeth was pleased to see the girl’s spirits rising, but wondered how her brother would feel about her attempts to encourage his sister to assert her independence. She was grateful, however, to Lady Catherine for offering her the distraction of worrying about Miss Darcy’s feelings; it was far more tolerable than her own concerns. With these thoughts, she continued to play till it was time for her party to return home.

Colonel Fitzwilliam and Miss Darcy called again at the parsonage the following day. Georgiana was anxious to spend time with her new idol. Although under ordinary circumstances Elizabeth would have enjoyed her company, Georgiana continued to be an unpleasant reminder of her brother. The suspicion that Darcy would not approve a friendship between his impressionable sister and the woman he wished to forget, and that he would not wish Georgiana to be tainted by Elizabeth’s low connections, could not but enter her thoughts. With her mind so occupied, it was difficult for Elizabeth to retain her concentration. Reflection must be reserved for solitary hours; whenever she was alone, she gave way to it as the greatest relief; and not a day went by without a solitary walk, in which she might indulge in all the delight of unpleasant recollections. But despite Elizabeth’s distraction, Miss Darcy pressed on her an invitation to visit with her at Rosings the next day, an invitation she dearly wished to decline, but she could come up with no excuse.

Thus it came to pass that the morrow found Elizabeth slowly making her way to Rosings, hoping against hope for the absence of Mr. Darcy. On her arrival, she was shown to a mercifully empty parlour while a servant went to locate Miss Darcy. To calm her nerves, she picked up a book lying on a table. Finding it to be a volume of poetry she had an interest in reading, she took it over to the window for better light and began to leaf through it.

Unaware of her presence in the room, Darcy entered, and was immediately captivated by the picture she made, her dark curls framed by the sunlight pouring in the window. Her lips were moving as she read, clearly tasting the metre and the rhythm of the poetry. He could not look away; all his anger with her momentarily drowned by his need to touch her face and kiss those lips.

Warned by some sense that she was no longer alone, Elizabeth looked up to discover Darcy, his dark eyes intent on her with a meaning she could not comprehend. A becoming flush stole up her cheeks at what he must think of her presence there. “Pardon me, sir; I did not mean to intrude; I am waiting for Miss Darcy,” she said with a certain agitation.

Say something, damn it! he told himself. “My apologies for disturbing you, Miss Bennet. I was merely looking for my book.”

Elizabeth looked down at the book in her hands with a sinking feeling. She closed it quickly and held it out in his direction. “This must be yours, then, sir,” she said, feeling as if she should apologize for trespassing on his property by having read it even for a moment.

“If you are enjoying it, Miss Bennet, please continue; there are many other books I can read… Are you fond of Wordsworth?” he asked desperately, not completely sure why he was pursuing this conversation. She had once again undercut his equanimity, and it was hard to recall why he had been so angry with her when she was before him.

“I have enjoyed what I have read of it,” she replied automatically. “When I was in London there was a discussion one evening at my uncle’s house about Mr. Wordsworth and Mr. Coleridge, and how they have been transforming the art of poetry. Mr. Monkhouse, whose cousin is married to Mr. Wordsworth, was saying that his personal vision of nature contrasts with the formal meanings that were common to Cowper and Gray, and I was curious to see for myself what might appear in this edition…” She felt as if she were talking to no purpose but to fill the empty space in the room.

“You have not read this collection before, then?” He was beginning to recover himself from the shock of seeing her so unexpectedly, and his voice grew more formal and distant.

She heard the surprise and the chill in his voice. “No, sir, I have not had that privilege,” she said shortly, loath to admit a deficiency in her education to him. Since he had made no move to take the book from her, she set it down on the neutral territory of a small table.

“You are welcome to read it, Miss Bennet. You might enjoy Lyrical Ballads by Coleridge and Wordsworth as well – that was their first published work.”

The turn of his countenance was making her quite uncomfortable, as did his condescension in pointing out the obvious regarding poetry. “I have read many poems from it already; it indeed heralded a new age in poetry. I am interested to see where Mr. Wordsworth goes with his current work in progress.” She looked at him challengingly.

The Prelude? What do you think of it?”

Displeased to find that she could not better him on the subject, Elizabeth said shortly, “I have seen only brief excerpts from it.”

“I hope that you will have the opportunity to discover it for yourself in its entirety soon, then, or at least such parts as have been published,” Darcy said lamely, aware that he had somehow displeased her.

Elizabeth heard his discomfort and misinterpreted it. “Thank you, Mr. Darcy, but we must be realistic, must we not?” she said with a bite in her voice. “I must consider my restricted opportunities; after all, my father has an excellent library for a man of his means, but that does not extend to the newest books; those of us with inferior connections cannot hope to have such amenities.”

Darcy grew pale. “Miss Bennet,” he replied, his uneasiness causing him to take on an unintentionally haughty air, “I did not mean to imply anything of the sort.”

Finding his manner infuriating, she discovered that once opened, the wound would not close. “My uncle may have entertained Mr. Wordsworth himself, but of course, he is merely in trade and could not be expected to have such sensibilities. Is it not a degradation for you, Mr. Darcy, to even discuss this with me? What would your family think?” She caught her breath, horrified that she had uncontrollably poured out to him her injured feelings in such a manner. “Pray excuse me, Mr. Darcy!” Blindly, she moved past him, thinking only of escape.

Darcy, stunned by this unexpected attack, put out a hand to stop her flight. It had never occurred to him that she might feel wounded by what he saw as his factual recitation of the gulf between them. “Miss Bennet,” he said, his voice pained, “It was never my intention to grieve you in any way.”

She looked up at his pale face. “Then you have gone about it in a most unusual way!” She was mortified to realize that her eyes were swimming with tears. “If you would be so kind as to release me, sir.”

He removed his hand from her arm instantly. “I shall trouble you no further, madam,” he said formally, cut to the quick by her sudden fury. You fool! he raged to himself. Did you learn nothing from that horrible night? She wants nothing to do with you; how much clearer can she be? The conclusion was as intolerable as ever.

“Miss Bennet!” came Georgiana’s light tones from the doorway, causing both Elizabeth and Darcy to immediately attempt to assume poses of exemplary propriety. Even Georgiana could not be blind to the tension in the room as Darcy bowed silently and exited. However, as she could think of no possible source of disagreement between her brother and her new friend, she quickly dismissed the incident from her mind.

Elizabeth could not forget it so easily – her sense of humiliation could not have been any greater than it was after her outburst at Darcy. It was dreadful enough that he thought those things of her; to have him know how much his scorn for her family disturbed her was worse. She was furious with herself for displaying her vulnerability to his criticism, and could not begin to imagine what he must be thinking of her now. No sooner had she left Rosings after her visit with Miss Darcy than she resolved that under no circumstances would she ever set foot there again. If she had to lay abed pleading illness until her departure for London, she would do so.

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Allentown, county seat of Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, is the state’s third most populous city.  Allentown is significant historically speaking for being the place where the Liberty Bell (formerly known as the Pennsylvania State House Bell) was hidden from the British during the American Revolutionary War.  The Liberty Bell was concealed in the basement of the Old Zion Reformed Church, in what is currently center city Allentown.  Today, a shrine in the church’s basement marks the exact spot where the Liberty Bell was hidden.  Many people travel to this city in Pennsylvania–lawyers, doctors, teachers, schoolchildren, and more–to see the replica Liberty Bell where the real Bell was hidden so many years ago.

Allentown’s high rate of crime helps keep Pennsylvania lawyers busy.  The city’s known criminal offenses (as reported to the FBI) in 2006 included around 800 violent crimes and more than 7,000 property crimes.  Allentown exceeded national averages in all categories of crimes other than aggravated assault.  Arsons lead the pack, since arson cases in Allentown were almost double the national average.  Other crimes well above the national averages included robbery, murder, and forcible rape.  Fortunately, incidents of reported crimes in the city dropped in 2007.  Violent crime dropped by 18 percent and crime in general dropped by 9 percent.

One reason for Allentown’s relatively high rate of crime is a high gang presence.  Many of the nation’s most violent gangs now have significant contingents in Allentown, due in large part to the crackdown on gangs in New York City and elsewhere during the 1990′s.  Known gangs located in Allentown include the 18th Street, the Black Dragons, the Bloods, the Crips, the Latin Kings, Los Solidos, the Mexican Mafia, and MS-13.  Over 75% of Allentown’s 2007 homicides during were drug or gang-related killings.  Law enforcement officials and the government, including some Pennsylvania lawyers, have undertaken several initiatives in an attempt to combat the growing gang problem.

Whether a defendant is accused of a gang-related crime or not, one thing is certain:  Pennsylvania lawyers experienced in practicing criminal defense can help guide their Allentown clients through the criminal process.  While U.S. law states that every accused is innocent until proven guilty, having a criminal defense attorney on your side is the smart way to go.  They know the laws and rights pertaining to criminal defense backwards and forwards, and probably upside down as well!  Just the right sort of expert to have on your side when you step into the courtroom and face your accuser.

Pennsylvania lawyers also practice civil law–including areas such as employment law, family law, medical malpractice law, immigration law, and personal injury law–in Allentown.  Defendants in civil cases are never subject to punishments as severe as those handed down in criminal cases, no matter the type of crime charged.  The burden of proof is also much lower in a civil case.  If the evidence shows there is more than a fifty percent probability the defendant is responsible, the jury can return a guilty verdict.  The defendant will then be responsible for making reparations to the plaintiff.

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