Ronald Noble

1956–1982: Early life and education

Noble was born in Fort Dix, a United States Army post south-east of Trenton, New Jersey, to an African-American father and a German mother. He was raised in nearby Jobstown, where his father worked as a janitor after serving as a master sergeant in the army. Noble attended Northern Burlington County Regional High School before graduating from the University of New Hampshire in 1979 with a bachelor's degree in economics and business administration. He later attended Stanford Law School, serving as an editor on the Stanford Law Review and graduating cum laude in 1982.

1983–1999: Beginnings and public service

Noble began his career as a law clerk for the late A. Leon Higginbotham Jr., a judge at the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, who persuaded him to enter public service. In 1984, he became an assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania under Edward S. G. Dennis, where he prosecuted several high-profile drug and corruption cases in Philadelphia. He then moved to the Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. in 1988 to work as a deputy assistant Attorney General and chief of staff for Dennis, who had been appointed the assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division under Attorney Generals Edwin Meese and Richard L. Thornburgh. In 1993, Noble was appointed as the Under Secretary of the Treasury for Enforcement, being placed in charge of the Secret Service, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF), the Customs Service Office of Enforcement, the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center, the Office of Foreign Assets Control and the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network. He was head of the department's "Waco Administrative Review Team", which produced a report on the ATF's actions against the Branch Davidians, leading to the Waco siege.

In 1994, following a plane crash in the south lawn of the White House carried out by Frank Eugene Corder, Secretary of the Treasury Lloyd Bentsen directed Under Secretary Noble and Secret Service director Eljay B. Bowron to conduct a "thorough and comprehensive" investigation into the circumstances leading to the plane crash. In 1995, a public report of the White House Security Review was published, with President Bill Clinton accepting all its recommendations and announcing the closure of the portion of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House on May 21, 1995, restricting movement only to pedestrian traffic to eliminate the threat of any potential car bomb or truck bomb attacks, as well as changes to air traffic rules and other security measures.

In 1996, Noble returned to the New York University School of Law, whose faculty he had joined three years earlier, to continue working as a tenured professor. In 1998, he participated as a witness for the defence during the trial for the impeachment of Clinton.

2000–2014: Interpol

In 1998, with the support of Attorney General Janet Reno and FBI director Louis Freeh, Noble applied to become the secretary-general of Interpol and succeed incumbent Raymond Kendall. On November 3, 2000, at the age of 44, Noble was elected to the position, becoming the first non-European, the first non-white, the first American, the first African-American and the youngest secretary-general in the organization's history. On September 20, 2005, during Interpol's 74th General Assembly in Berlin, Germany, he was unanimously re-elected for a second five-year term, after having been unanimously nominated for the post by the organization's Executive Committee the previous year. On November 9, 2010, Noble was re-elected again for a third term as secretary-general during the organization's 79th General Assembly in Doha, Qatar. On November 7, 2014, he stepped down from the role and was succeeded by Jürgen Stock, who was unanimously elected during Interpol's 83rd General Assembly in Monaco.

2015–present: Security consultancy

After his time with Interpol, Noble founded a multinational security consultancy firm, RKN Global DWC LLC, headquartered in Dubai, UAE. In February 2016, the firm announced plans to build a security printing plant in Banská Bystrica, Slovakia, in a project that would need funding of €89 million and employ 1,200 people. However, on June 24, 2016, the firm rejected an investment subsidy of €18 million from the Government of Slovakia and withdrew the plans following political opposition to the project in the country, with the firm also fearing to move forward with the plans in the wake of Brexit.

Personal life

Noble is married and has one son. A multilingual, he speaks French, Spanish and German in addition to English.

Honours