A native of Fort Smith, William Temple graduated from Hendrix in 1973 with a degree in History and Political Science. He began his studies at the University of Arkansas School of Law in Fayetteville in the fall of that year. He graduated in 1976 with a Juris Doctor degree and passed the Arkansas Bar examination that summer. He was hired as a Deputy Prosecuting Attorney in Sebastian County, Arkansas in the fall of 1976 and spent 13 months in that position.
Temple began his career as an FBI Special Agent in November 1977. He spent 11 years as field investigator prior to entering the management ranks of the Bureau in 1989. He progressed through a variety of senior management positions over approximately the next 20 years, to include being promoted to Deputy Assistant Director and serving as Acting Assistant Director. He completed his career by being appointed Special Agent in Charge of the FBI in Arkansas in 2002 and retired from the Bureau in May 2008. In October 2009 he began working for the Arkansas Department of Health as the Branch Chief for Trauma and Injury Prevention, where he is responsible for the implementation of the state’s new trauma system.
He is married to the former Rhona Weaver and has two sons, both of whom reside with their families in Huntersville, N.C.