A day after Great Northern Paper filed for voluntary bankruptcy in Delaware where it is incorporated, three of Great Northern Paper’s creditors filed an involuntary petition in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Bangor. The creditors were unaware that Great Northern had already sought bankruptcy protection.

Jeremy Fischer, attorney for the three creditors, said his clients’ Tuesday filing reflects Great Northern’s inability to resolve long-standing bills.

“(My clients) have tried every option to collect those amounts for nearly a year,” Fischer, an attorney at Drummond Woodsum in Portland, wrote in an email. “Even after the petitioning creditors obtained stipulated judgments in May 2014 in Maine state court, GNP failed to make any offer of repayment and refused to provide basic disclosures about its financial affairs. Bankruptcy is the petitioning creditors’ last resort, and they hope that an independent bankruptcy trustee can efficiently investigate and recover GNP’s assets and fairly distribute them to all creditors.”

The three petitioning creditors are Hartt Transportation Systems Inc. of Bangor, which claims it’s owed $227,528.49; Lynch Logistics Inc. of Bangor, claiming $176,487.61; and Lynco Inc. of Bangor, which claims $9,862.97.

Fischer said his clients’ involuntary filing could move the venue of the impending bankruptcy case from Delaware to Maine. That decision will be left to the bankruptcy court in Delaware, where an Oct. 15 meeting of creditors has been scheduled.

“The petitioning creditors are confident that venue will be transferred to Maine where most of the assets and most of the creditors are located,” wrote Fischer.