A former mayoral candidate whose causing problems for D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray's administration had six run-ins with the law before he received a $110,000-a-year job with the city, The Washington Post reported.
Fired city employee Sulaimon Brown, a minor candidate for mayor in 2010, alleges that Gray's campaign paid him and offered him that city job in exchange for attacking Mayor Adrian Fenty on the campaign trail. He lost that job after reports of a 2007 protective order filed by the mother of a 13-year-old girl and accusing Brown of stalking. The order was never enforced or served on Brown.
The Gray administration knew of three charges in D.C., including the restraining order and an unlawful entry conviction, when Brown was hired to a position with the Department of Health Care Finance, but only recently did it learn of an attempted murder charge in Chicago in 1988, of which Brown was acquitted, city officials and sources close to Gray told The Post. The administration also was unaware of an arrest on suspicion of assault in East Orange, N.J., in 2008, for which he was never indicted.
A 1991 gun possession charge against Brown was dismissed, as was a 2002 simple assault charge.
Officials with the Health Care Finance agency told Brown on Jan. 26 - five days before he began work - that it wanted to a perform background check, according to e-mails obtained by The Washington Post.
Brown told the officials that there was no need. He directed them to Gerri Mason Hall, the mayor's chief of staff, who he said would vouch for him. "Please contact Gerri Mason Hall, as it relates to that," Brown wrote in one of the e-mails. "Her office has already done a complete background check on me. I was placed with you by her office."
Hall had no comment for The Post Monday, but a government source said Brown's e-mail was inaccurate.
The Sulaimon Brown controversy led to Gray ordering tougher personnel review and background checks of all excepted service appointees in his administration.
