Bill was born November 19, 1952, in Vienna, Georgia. He received his Bachelor of Science degree in 1974 from the United States Naval Academy, then served as a lieutenant in the United States Navy from 1974 to 1979 in the Western Pacific. He received his Juris Doctor, cum laude, from the University of Georgia in 1981, where he was a member of the editorial board for the Georgia Law Review. While on Law Review, he published Case Comment, “Discretionary Function Exception to the F.T.C.A.” Georgia Law Review (15:1981).

From 1982 to 1983 Bill clerked for Honorable Hardy Gregory, Jr., Supreme Court of Georgia. He is a member of the Western Circuit Bar Association, the American Bar Association, the Georgia Defense Lawyers Association, the State Bar of Georgia, the Texas Bar and the Georgia Bar Foundation Board of Trustees, of which he is a past president.

In 2017, The Georgia Bar Foundation presented Bill with its highest award, in appreciation for extraordinary service in their efforts to aid needful Georgians.

His practice is products liability and general civil litigation.

Bill has tried cases throughout the country and is a veteran of most of the major asbestos personal injury consolidations of the 1990’s, including consolidations in Texas, Louisiana, West Virginia, and Maryland. Bill is one of the most visible and well-known trial lawyers of the asbestos litigation. Bill may have tried more cases than any individual currently active in asbestos trial practice. He has tried cases in more than a dozen states. 

Bill worked with or has cross-examined most of the well-known experts in all areas of the asbestos litigation. He has greater access to plaintiff and defense expert witnesses than virtually anyone in the national asbestos scene today. He has tried cases against many of the leading advocates for the asbestos plaintiffs and is recognized as an able and tenacious adversary. His charm with juries is well-known and dreaded by the plaintiff’s bar.