Concord Man Pleads Guilty to Manchester Bank Robbery

CONCORD, NH — A New Hampshire man who was previously convicted of holding campaign workers hostage in 2007 has pleaded guilty to a bank robbery charges in U.S. District Court yesterday, according to U.S. Attorney Emily Gray Rice. Leeland Eisenberg, of Concord, pleaded guilty on Feb. 23, 2017, to a single count after robbing the Citizens Bank on Elm Street in Manchester on Aug. 2, 2016.

The bank, Rice noted in a press statement, was robbed by a man around noontime who walked into the bank, approached the teller station, and handed a teller a robbery note, stating, “No alarms. No dye packs. I have a gun and I will shoot you and others if you put a dye pack in. Fill the bag with cash now.”

The robber was an older white male with dark hair, eyeglasses, and wearing a blue jacket.

A witness in the vicinity of the bank identified the robber as Eisenberg.

"The witness had known Eisenberg in the past and recognized Eisenberg as he left the bank," Rice said in a statement. "An image of the robber taken by the bank’s security system was distributed to law enforcement who shared it with the public and press. Law enforcement officers familiar with Eisenberg also identified the robber as Eisenberg after reviewing the images, she noted.

Eisenberg was arrested by two Manchester officers in the area of the Pine Street Cemetery later that evening. At the time of his arrest, he was in possession of 10 bags of what appeared to be crack cocaine.

Subsequent laboratory testing of the material in the bags established it was powder cocaine, according to court testimony. Eisenberg will be sentenced in June.

Eisenberg was convicted of holding hostages in Hillary Clinton’s Rochester campaign office in November 2007. He reportedly cited a television ad as the reason he was at the campaign office and claimed he had a bomb strapped to his chest, according to ABC News. After a six-hour siege, he was arrested. He also never actually had a bomb, according to reports. Eisenberg was sentenced to up to seven years in prison. Eisenberg escaped from a halfway house in 2013, but was caught not long after.