Oak Harbor company defunct, in bankruptcy

11/3/2001

An Oak Harbor firm that had hoped to find an audience for its machinery designed to provide extra-pure water has filed for bankruptcy and is defunct.

Ridgewood Waterpure Corp. was formed after some northwest Ohio investors purchased the patents and intellectual property rights of a California company that had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, said H. Buswell Roberts, a Toledo attorney representing Ridgewood. His client filed for Chapter 7 liquidation in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Toledo, claiming assets of $720,000 and liabilities of $8.3 million.

As part of that deal, Ridgewood agreed to pay a pro-rated distribution of about $500,000 to a number of the creditors in the California bankruptcy filing, Mr. Roberts said. The company was not able to do that, nor pay back loans it had received, after the market failed to materialize, he said.