William P. Ford was the brother of Ita Ford

Ita Ford

Ita Ford, M.M. was a Roman Catholic Maryknoll Sister missionary to Bolivia, Chile and El Salvador. She worked with the poor and war refugees. On December 2, 1980, she was tortured, raped, and murdered, along with fellow missionaries Maura Clarke, M.M., laywoman Jean Donovan, and Dorothy Kazel,...

, and an advocate for his sister and the people of El Salvador

El Salvador

El Salvador or simply Salvador is the smallest and the most densely populated country in Central America. The country's capital city and largest city is San Salvador; Santa Ana and San Miguel are also important cultural and commercial centers in the country and in all of Central America...

.

Legal career

He graduated from Fordham College in 1960, and later received his law degree from St. John's University. Originally, he worked for the law firm of Mudge Rose, and later formed his own firm. He was closely involved with the organization, Human Rights First

Human Rights First

Human Rights First is a nonprofit, nonpartisan human rights organization based in New York City and Washington, D.C....

. He received an honorary doctoral degree from Fordham University

Fordham University

Fordham University is a private, nonprofit, coeducational research university in the United States, with three campuses in and around New York City. It was founded by the Roman Catholic Diocese of New York in 1841 as St...

 in 1990.
As part of a campaign for justice for his sister, he obtained a 54.6 million dollar liability ruling against Jose Guillermo Garcia

José Guillermo García

José Guillermo García is former general of the military of El Salvador and was minister of defense during the Revolutionary Government Junta of El Salvador. He emigrated to the United States in 1989. He was sued, along with Carlos Eugenio Vides Casanova, in the United States district court in...

 and Carlos Eugenio Vides Casanova

Carlos Eugenio Vides Casanova

Carlos Eugenio Vides Casanova was head of the Salvadoran national guard and later defense minister. He was sued in the federal civil court of Miami, Florida in the United States in two precedent-setting cases. The cases are referred to by the surname of his co-defendant, José Guillermo García:*...

, who were retired El Savadorean generals living in the United States.