Imperial Credit Files for Bankruptcy Protection

Torrance-based Imperial Credit Industries Inc., the parent of a bank that failed in February, filed for protection from creditors under Chapter 11 of federal bankruptcy law.

Imperial Credit, spun off from Imperial Bank in the mid-1980s, listed $190 million in liabilities and $20 million in assets in its filing in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Los Angeles. The biggest creditors were J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., owed $127 million, and the Internal Revenue Service, owed $15 million.

Imperial’s former subsidiary, Southern Pacific Bank, a three-branch industrial bank based in Torrance, was shut down Feb. 7 by regulators.

E. Scott Reckard