Sulaimon Brown releases money orders he says he got from Gray campaign consultant

With his testimony before the D.C. Council looming, former mayoral candidate Sulaimon Brown made available copies of five money-order contributions he said he received from Howard L. Brooks, a campaign consultant to Mayor Vincent C. Gray.

The money orders — made out to “Sulaimon Brown for Mayor” — total more than $600 and allegedly are a portion of payments Brown claims he received from Brooks and Lorraine A. Green, chairman of Gray’s campaign, to disparage then-Mayor Adrian M. Fenty during last year’s elections. Brown, a long-shot candidate in last year’s race, alleges he was also promised a city job if Gray won.

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• March: Brown says he struck a job deal
• February: Brown, fired after allegations of criminal record

Brown made the documents available to The Washington Post after the newspaper found that Brown campaign records possibly listed three friends or relatives of the Brooks family as alleged contributors. Brown said the money orders contained signatures and addresses that his campaign tried to decipher when it recorded the contributions, but campaign finance reports show misspelled names and incomplete addresses.

After researching the documents, The Post found the following apparent links: a $225 donation from Brooks’s son, Peyton; $100 from Litonya Livingston, who said she is Peyton’s girlfriend; and $335 from Aundrea Naylor, a cousin to Howard Brooks’s wife.

Livingston, of Silver Spring, denied the contribution, adding that she did not know why her name and address were listed on Brown’s campaign records.

“I have nothing to do with this,” she said in an interview Friday.

Naylor has called her apparent contribution to Brown’s campaign “bogus” and said she did not know how her name appeared in his report. She did not return a call or an e-mail last week.

Troy W. Poole, Peyton Brooks’s attorney, did not return a call for comment. Glenn F. Ivey, Howard Brooks’s attorney, said only, “Because there is an ongoing investigation, I can’t comment on the specifics at this time.”

Howard Brooks, Green and Gray have denied Brown’s claims, which have spawned several investigations, including by the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Brown — who said he does not know Peyton Brooks, Livingston or Naylor — said Friday that he was contacted last week by FBI investigators probing the contributions.

Brown to testify Monday

A D.C. Council committee, investigating hiring practices by the mayor’s administration, expects to hear from Brown on Monday, but Howard and Peyton Brooks have informed the council that, if called to testify, they will assert their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.

In January, the Gray administration hired Brown as a $110,000-a-year special assistant in the Department of Health Care Finance. He was later dismissed and, shortly after, made his allegations in a Post story. The Post has not been able to independently verify any payments.

The younger Brooks also was hired — as a $110,000-a-year special assistant in the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development. In the wake of allegations of nepotism against the administration, he was one of four children of members of the Gray campaign or administration to resign their city jobs.