Standoff Ends With Surrender At Clinton Office
Suspect Is in Custody After Freeing Hostages in N.H.

By Alec MacGillis and Michael D. Shear
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, December 1, 2007; A01

ROCHESTER, N.H., Nov. 30 -- A man who claimed he had a bomb strapped to his chest seized four workers in Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign office here Friday afternoon, police said, holding them for more than five hours and demanding to speak to Clinton before surrendering to police.

The suspect, identified as Leeland Eisenberg, 47, a gadfly well known to local police for his erratic behavior, gave himself up to a SWAT team around 6:15 p.m., lying flat on the pavement and being handcuffed. The capture ended a drama that interrupted the political chaos that normally engulfs New Hampshire as the presidential primary approaches.

No one was injured, and police said the alleged bomb turned out to be road flares. Clinton (N.Y.), the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, was in the Washington, D.C., area during the incident. She canceled a planned speech to the Democratic National Committee on Friday.

In a brief statement to reporters after Eisenberg was arrested, Clinton praised law enforcement officers for bringing a peaceful end to "a very hard day," and thanking the young volunteers and paid staffers who are toiling in New Hampshire on behalf of her campaign.

"Every four years, extraordinary young people come to places like New Hampshire because they want to change our country," Clinton said in Washington before heading to the Granite State. "I want to commend every one of them from every campaign. I'm so grateful for them every single day."

Eisenberg demanded cigarettes, alcohol and Pepsi throughout the tense afternoon, police said late Friday. They said Clinton had been willing to talk to the suspect but was discouraged from doing so by tactical officers who did not want to meet that demand too quickly.

She suspended campaigning for the afternoon, 34 days before the first voting takes place on Jan. 3 in Iowa. "Everything stopped," she said. "We had nothing on our minds besides the safety of these young people." Aides to rival Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) said he suspended campaigning for the day, as well. Former North Carolina senator John Edwards issued a statement expressing thanks that no one was hurt.

Police said Eisenberg entered the small, storefront Clinton office about 12:45 p.m. Friday and promptly let a mother leave with her baby, police said. The office was quickly surrounded by police and SWAT units while TV helicopters captured the response from the air.

A Manchester, N.H., television station reported Friday night that Eisenberg was scheduled to be in court in nearby Dover about an hour after entering the Clinton office, on a domestic violence hearing.

Witnesses said an armored truck containing a Dover SWAT team approached the Clinton storefront about 3 p.m., and police used the vehicle's loudspeaker to communicate with the hostage-taker. Several witnesses said they heard police promising that they would not storm the facility and that they wanted to talk.

Anderson Cooper, an anchor with CNN, later revealed that Eisenberg had also been communicating by phone with the network's reporters throughout the afternoon. Cooper said that the suspect called CNN offices several times to complain that he had "mental problems and couldn't get anyone to help him."

About 2:45 p.m., a young woman ran out of the office and was escorted to the nearby command post by a SWAT officer. Police said later that she had dashed out of the office without the suspect's permission.

At 5:30, another young woman wearing jeans and a black shirt walked out of the Clinton office and was escorted to a police armored car by a SWAT officer. The final hostage, a young man, was released moments before Eisenberg finally gave himself up.

Police said negotiations with Eisenberg were conducted by a veteran female officer, who talked via cellphones and land lines to the hostages, who then relayed their conversations to the suspect. Police said Eisenberg will face state charges of kidnapping and reckless conduct. They said federal charges could follow.

Eisenberg lived in a motel on the outskirts of this riverside manufacturing town of 28,000 little touched by seacoast New Hampshire's high-tech boom but was often seen strolling along Rochester's faded colonial main streets.

This spring, when police launched a campaign to remind motorists to lock their cars by placing fliers on the front seats, Eisenberg took umbrage at what he saw as an invasion of privacy. After finding a flier in his car, he called an impromptu news conference and complained to government officials, local news reports say.

In April of this year, according to a police log, Eisenberg was arrested and charged with two counts of stalking. In June, his car was spotted weaving along Washington Street, and he was arrested and charged with drunken driving.

Five years earlier, Eisenberg had sued the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Boston and Cardinal Bernard Law, saying that he had been molested by priest at the St. Catherine's Parish in Westford, Mass., in the early 1980s. Court documents depicted Eisenberg as a homeless man of 21, living in abandoned cars at a local junkyard. He told priests at St. Catherine's about the loss of his mother, court documents say, and a violent, alcoholic father. They gave him a cot in the basement, food and help in exchange for odd jobs. But soon, the suit alleges, one priest repeatedly plied him with alcohol and molested him.

In 1996, the Boston Herald reported that a man named Leeland Eisenberg, who was serving a 10- to 20-year sentence for aggravated rape in a Concord, Mass., prison, received a thick voter questionnaire on domestic issues from Robert J. Dole's presidential campaign. Eisenberg completed the survey and sent it to the Herald.

To a question about "vital campaign issues," Eisenberg responded, "Require politicians to be legally responsible for their campaign pledges and prosecute those promises, which result in perjury, fraud, deceit and deception to national trust."

Shear reported from Washington. Staff writers Anne E. Kornblut, John Solomon, Rachel Dry and Elizabeth Williamson; and research editor Alice Crites contributed to this report.