Hostage-Taker at Clinton Office Caught After Escape

Leeland Eisenberg had walked away from halfway house
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Apr 8, 2013 1:34 AM CDT
Updated Apr 8, 2013 3:20 PM CDT
Clinton Office Hostage Taker Escapes
SWAT team members take Leeland Eisenberg into custody after a hostage and standoff situation at the Hillary Clinton campaign office in Rochester, NH, Friday, Nov. 30, 2007.   (AP Photo/Foster's Daily Democrat, Craig Osborne)

The New Hampshire man who held six people hostage during a standoff at a Hillary Clinton campaign office in 2007 was captured today after walking away from a halfway house, the AP reports. Police found Leeland Eisenberg, 52, at a resource center looking over job applications. Officers took him to a state prison, where he may have to serve 3 1/2 to 7 years on an escape charge. "As far as why he left, we don't have any information," said a corrections department spokesman. "He had been following the rules."

Eisenberg—who has two rape convictions—was released on probation in 2009 but was sentenced to 3 1/2 to seven years the following year for parole violations including cutting off his electronic monitoring bracelet. Nobody was hurt in the 2007 incident at Clinton's office, during which Eisenberg taped several road flares to himself and claimed to have a gun. The county attorney who argued against allowing Eisenberg on a work-release program says he isn't surprised by the latest escape, the Union Leader reports. "He has a history, a pattern of incidents like this," he says. "How many chances do you give someone?" (More Leeland Eisenberg stories.)

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