Saunders (Willis) is born in Boston.

The son of Bahamian immigrants, Willis Saunders graduates from Boston Trade High School, serves as a Tuskegee Airman in World War II, and returns to graduate from Howard University and Northeastern University. He joins the Boston Police Department in 1956, and subsequently becomes the first African-American deputy superintendent in the Boston Police Department. After his retirement, Saunders he serves as chief of the Boston Housing Authority police department. He dies in Boston on January 26, 2012.