The burglary over the weekend at the New Hampshire Democratic Party's Concord headquarters came five weeks after a break-in at a Democratic Party office in Manchester.

The door to the Manchester Democratic Committee office was broken down sometime over the weekend of Jan. 20 to 21, according to party officials and the Manchester police. Raymond Buckley, chairman of the city Democrats and vice chairman of the state Democratic Party, said he doesn't believe anything was taken from or vandalized in the Manchester office, and he dismissed any connection between that incident and the burglary of the party's headquarters in Concord last weekend.

"There was nothing missing, and the door has been replaced," Buckley said.

The Concord police are investigating the burglary at the headquarters, which was reported to the police Monday morning. Sgt. Mike McGuire of the Concord police said his department is pursuing leads in the burglary, but he declined to specify what had been taken. Democratic Party officials have not said what's missing from the headquarters, although party spokeswoman Kathleen Strand said Monday that no personal financial information appeared to have been taken.

"We want to assure our donors that their personal financial information, as far as we can tell, has been protected, and we hope to find out who did this soon," Strand said.

Several Democrats, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that laptops and other equipment had been taken from the party headquarters, though they said it appears that any sensitive information was protected by passwords or stored on servers that were not taken from the building.

Lt. Walter Carroll of the Concord police said his investigators have contacted the state attorney general's office and the FBI about the burglary, since it occurred at a political party's office. He said Concord detectives learned of the break-in at the Manchester Democratic office Tuesday afternoon and spoke yesterday morning with the Manchester police to see if there were any similarities between the two break-ins.

The state Democratic Party headquarters is in a large office building at 2½ Beacon St., near the corner of North State Street. Among the other businesses in the building are massage therapists, medical laboratories and state government offices.

The Manchester Democratic offices are on the second floor of a building at 848 Elm St. in downtown Manchester. The building's street-level door is usually locked. According to Sgt. Maureen Tessier of the Manchester police, the party office's door was found forced open Monday, Jan. 22. When an officer arrived at the offices, Mike Brunelle, executive director of the Manchester Democratic Committee, told the officer that nothing seemed to have been stolen, Tessier said.

"There has been no further investigation," Tessier said.

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By DANIEL BARRICK

Monitor staff