Patriarch offers $5M for PVI

The New York-based private equity fund that owns emergency-vehicle maker American LaFrance has offered to buy the assets of bankrupt armored truck maker Protected Vehicles Inc.

Patriarch Partners LLC has signed an agreement with Protected Vehicles to pay $5 million for the North Charleston company's remaining assets, according to a document filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Charleston.

Protected Vehicles said its assets are worth $5.2 million, but it believes the $5 million offer "is the highest and best recovery the debtor can expect to receive for such assets."

The sale would not include any potential liabilities Protected Vehicles might face as a result of a lawsuit filed against it last year by competitor Force Protection Inc. of Ladson, which has alleged that Protected Vehicles executives who formerly worked for Force Protection stole trade secrets that they used to start the rival company.

Creditors of Protected Vehicles filed court papers in January to force the company into involuntary bankruptcy liquidation.

The company filed its own bankruptcy reorganization proceeding the following month and has fought to prevent its creditors from forcing it into liquidation.

At the time of the February reorganization filing, Protected Vehicles said it had assets of $24 million and debts of $54.1 million.

Patriarch Partners bought Summerville-based American LaFrance in 2005 from its former owner, Freightliner LLC, for an undisclosed amount. The 175-year-old firetruck maker filed its own bankruptcy reorganization last January and emerged from bankruptcy in May.