Willful blindness is a legal term; it means that there were things that you could and should have known about a situation, but you chose to remain ignorant.
How many times have you seen examples of this in your personal or professional life? It reminds me a lot of the "ostrich sticking its head in the sand" analogy. You are purposely trying not to know.
Since I work in HR, I've seen many instances of willful blindness at work. Let me share one with you- people working off the clock. First, a brief summary of pay rules for nonexempt employees. Your employer is REQUIRED to pay you for ALL hours that you work. Of course, your company can reserve the right to preapprove any hours that you work. However, if you work without gaining this approval, they still HAVE to pay you. They can of course discipline or even terminate you for not getting preapproval, but they still owe you the wages.
We (HR) have had complaints from time to time about people working more hours that they are turning in for payment. One supervisor said "I know Jane comes into work early, but she does personal things like her online banking". Well, let me tell you, her online banking screen sure looks an awful lot like the enterprise software that we use to run our company. Another clue: Work e-mails are sent outside the hours for which the person is being paid-DUH. Even if you claim you didn't notice, "you could and should have known".
Next time you hear someone trying to use a dubious ignorance excuse for something, remember this phrase. I bet it won't be too long before you find a situation to which it applies.
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