MOORE TWP., Pa. — The former mother-in-law of Lehigh Valley congressional candidate Bob Brooks claims in a lawsuit that he has engaged in a "malicious caper" and "skullduggery" to defraud her of more than $162,000 and hide his assets from her.
The suit is the latest legal chapter between Brooks, president of the Pennsylvania Professional Fire Fighters Association, and Carol Wiley, of Upper Nazareth Township.
The two have been tangled in litigation for nearly eight years over the 1-acre township property where Brooks resides.
The suit comes as Brooks seeks the Democratic nomination for Pennsylvania's 7th Congressional District, one of the most contested U.S. House seats in the country.
"They know he will go down to Washington and take on Donald Trump and a broken political system."Jenna Koufman, Bob Brooks' campaign manager
Brooks may not be a household name in the Lehigh Valley, but he has drawn significant support in the race. He's gotten endorsements from two former presidential candidates and the highest profile Democrat on this year's ballot.
In addition, Brooks raised more than $609,000 toward his campaign in the second half of last year.
In response to an email asking about the lawsuit, the Brooks campaign denied that he is trying to hide his assets from Wiley.
Jenna Koufman, Brooks' campaign manager, accused beltway Republicans and his political opponents of trying to use the lawsuit to distract voters from the issues.
"Bob spent 20 years as a Bethlehem firefighter running into fires, he has advocated for better health care and higher wages for his union members as the president of the Pennsylvania firefighters union," Kaufman said.
"And he has earned the backing of leaders ranging from Gov. Josh Shapiro to Sen. Bernie Sanders to Pete Buttigieg because they know he will go down to Washington and take on Donald Trump and a broken political system."
Years of legal wrangling
The litigation dates to 2004, when Michael Wiley, Carol Wiley's husband, transferred the 1-acre lot to Brooks and his daughter, who now goes by the name Jennifer Lynn Kostenbader.
The engaged couple was supposed to pay him $55,000 in return but never did, according to court documents.
In 2008, the then-married couple signed a promissory note agreeing to pay Carol Wiley $55,000 over 10 years at 6.5% annual interest.
But by the time the decade was over, Wiley had only received $100, according to court records.
Wiley sued Brooks and Kostenbader in 2018, seeking the full amount owed plus legal fees.
By then, the couple had divorced. Brooks kept the house, but Kostenbader relinquished her rights to the property. As a result, her name remained on the deed as Jennifer Lynn Brooks.
She never responded to the 2018 lawsuit, losing her end of the case by default.
Brooks took the 2018 suit to trial, arguing his name on the promissory note was a forgery. In 2020, a Northampton County judge ruled in Wiley's favor, citing the testimony of a notary who witnessed the agreement.
Brooks appealed the case on technical grounds but lost, leaving him with a judgment to pay Wiley more than $130,000 plus legal fees.
'Subterfuge' alleged
In a lawsuit filed in February, Wiley alleged that Brooks still has not paid the debt, which now adds up to $162,538.
In addition, she said Brooks has illegally transferred ownership of the township home to his second wife, Jennifer Lynne Brooks — spelled with an E.
Northampton County records show Brooks and Jennifer Lynne Brooks signed a quitclaim deed in 2022 to transfer the property solely to Jennifer Lynne Brooks.
However, the initial deed had Brooks and his first wife's name on it, meaning that Jennifer Lynne Brooks shouldn't have been able to sign away Jennifer Lynn Kostenbader's claim on the property, the suit argued.
Brooks and his current wife intentionally relied on confusion over the two women's names to slip the document past county officials, the suit alleged.
The same day as the deed transfer, Jennifer Lynne Brooks took out a mortgage on the township home for $330,000. None of that money went toward making Wiley whole, she said in court documents.
Wiley argued in the suit that the transfer was intended to prevent her from collecting on Brooks' debt. The mortgage also undervalues the home by $113,200, which limits her ability to collect what's owed to her, Wiley alleged.
In the suit, Wiley asked a judge to void the quitclaim and award her the $162,586 still owed to her plus punitive damages for the emotional stress caused by the alleged effort to defraud her.
"The defendants intended all along to cheat the plaintiff in order to get some money on the sneak by means of subterfuge and the phony loan," Wiley's lawsuit alleged.
David Dunn, a lawyer representing Wiley, declined to comment when reached by LehighValleyNews.com.
'It pains me to see'
Brooks and his current wife have not filed a response to Wiley's lawsuit. The couple are due in Northampton County Court on April 29 to argue why a judge should not void the quitclaim.
That hearing is scheduled less than three weeks before Democratic voters head to the polls.
The Brooks campaign did not disclose how he intended to respond to the lawsuit, saying only that he would follow the advice of his attorney.
While Kostenbader is not a party in the latest litigation, she did release a statement through the Brooks campaign offering support to her ex-husband.
In it, she said that her mother never once sought payment for the township property over a 12-year period. She and Wiley have not spoken in six years, Kostenbader said.
"To use this situation now as a way to demean my ex-husband is unjust, and I cannot in good conscience remain silent," Kostenbader said in the statement.
"Bob has been a devoted father to our two boys, and it pains me to see the truth twisted in a way that harms a good man."
LehighValleyNews.com independently confirmed Kostenbader stands by the statement. She declined further comment.
A blue-collar identity
Brooks has made his blue-collar identity central to his campaign.
The son of a single mother, he's talked about relying on SNAP benefits growing up and coming close to foreclosure because of health scares.
He's driven trucks, bartended, worked as a firefighter and started his own lawncare company to pay the bills.
"People want change. People want different."Lehigh Valley congressional candidate Bob Brooks
If elected, Brooks would become the first person without a college degree to represent the Lehigh Valley in the U.S. House since at least World War II.
Working-class voters are tired of being left behind and turned to Donald Trump and the MAGA movement in hopes of finding something better, Brooks has said.
He's argued on the campaign trail that his background gives him the unique ability to connect with people who have left the Democratic Party and bring them back into the fold.
"There's like 200 lawyers in Washington D.C.," Brooks said on the Lehigh Valley Political Pulse podcast earlier this year. "If we think lawyers are going to fix the issue, it would be done already.
"People want change. People want different."
Complicated financial picture
Brooks filed a statement of financial interest, or SOFI, in Washington earlier this year that paints a complicated financial picture, however.
Brooks and his wife are worth between $148,000 and $3.89 million, as NOTUS reported in February.
The forms require candidates to list each asset and liability under a range, which is responsible for the wide gulf in outcomes.
"Legally, there's not a whole lot that's going to effect him in the current cycle."Sam Chen, a campaign manager who worked for former U.S. Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Lehigh Valley
However, Brooks did not include the debt owed to Wiley on the form. With the owed money added in, Brooks could be the richest person in the Democratic primary, financially underwater or somewhere in between.
Kaufman told NOTUS that Brooks is not a millionaire and has never personally traded stock. His SOFI lists investments in companies such as Amazon, Alphabet, Coca-Cola, Eli Lilly and Netflix that are administered by an investment firm.
In a statement, Kaufman said Brooks did not disclose the Wiley debt because the two sides were trying to negotiate an amicable resolution at the time that he filed the SOFI.
But intention shouldn't be a factor when it comes to filing SOFIs, said Sam Chen, a campaign manager who worked for former U.S. Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Lehigh Valley, and a former chair of the House Ethics Committee.
If a candidate owes more than $10,000 to someone who isn't an immediate family member, it needs to be listed on the form, Chen said.
If an agreement is reached, the candidate can go back and file an amendment. Brooks filed an amended SOFI in January after submitting his original SOFI in December.
"If you owe a large sum of debt, that becomes a liability in a security situation," Chen said. "If you're a member of Congress and you're in debt six or seven figures, you are now a risk. Someone can use that to manipulate you."
It's unlikely that Brooks will face immediate consequences for not disclosing the debt in his SOFI, Chen said. If his campaign is successful, he may eventually face a fine.
"Legally, there's not a whole lot that's going to effect him in the current cycle," Chen said.
