The mutant monster bit is your fictional choice but the remaining scenarios are common practise in many coal mining areas of the world. The Dhanbad Mafia in Bihar India control so much stolen an illegally mined coal that if they were stopped there would be a grave risk to the local economy and many of the industries that rely on illegal coal locally. The Chinese don't seem to have a problem 'integrating' the sale of many thousands (if not millions) of tonnes of coal mined annually in illegal coal mines either. The fact that many illegal mines are dangerous (obvious reasons) ensures that many hundreds of mine workers die every year and a great number of those deaths are covered up by various means, one fairly common practice in China being to seal the men's bodies up and then abandon the mine. The fact is that even where there are Government paid benefits to men out of work for whatever reason there will always be ways that these guys manage to find cash in hand work to boost these minimum payments, around here there aren't any 'illegal' coal mines but there are dozens of large scale scrap metal yards that employ many men illegally, most of whom are claiming some means of unemployment funding.
Here's a few snippets from India and China;
Coal Mafia
An Indian coal mine. The Dhanbad mine complex is allegedly dominated by a coal mafia.
The state-owned coal mines of Bihar (now Jharkhand after the division of Bihar state) were among the first areas in India to see the emergence of a sophisticated mafia, beginning with the mining town of Dhanbad.[4] It is alleged that the coal industry's trade union leadership forms the upper echelon of this particular arrangement, and employs caste allegiances to maintain its power.[5] Pilferage and sale of coal on the black market, inflated or fictitious supply expenses, falsified worker contracts and the expropriation and leasing-out of government land have allegedly become routine.[6] A parallel economy has also developed with a significant fraction of the local population employed by the mafia in manually transporting the stolen coal for long distances over unpaved roads to illegal mafia warehouses and points of sale.[7]
The coal mafia has had a negative effect on Indian industry, with coal supplies and quality varying erratically. Higher quality coal is sometimes selectively diverted, and missing coal replaced with stones and boulders in railway cargo wagons. Once, even a human corpse has been discovered in a sealed coal wagon.
www.infraline.com/coal/freedownload/PaperCoalMafia-MenaceCoalIndustry.pdf“This happens mostly in Kusunda Colliery, Jharia Colliery and Putaki Balihari Colliery. Sources in the district said that nearly 500 persons, engaged in illegal coal trafficking, die every year in mishaps. But strangely, no body comes forward to claim their bodies for fear of being arrested.
The bodies lie discarded. As the abandoned mines”
Extract from;
www.deccanherald.com/content/135139/dhanbads-dirty-black-diamond.html“1st February 2006
Following a central government’s nation-wide order issued in August last year, a total of 4,876 illegal mines have been closed in Shanxi and 1,268 mining officials in the province have been “handled with administrative procedures”.
A central government investigation team found that 952 government officials in the province had personal investments in coal mine operations, involving a total of 156 million yuan of investments. Among those officials, 947 have withdrawn their personal investments in coal mine businesses, amounting to 151 million yuan of investments, according to Xinhua News Agency.”
Extract from;
www.zippyinfo.net/mac/article.php?a=6413The above action dated 2006 undoubtedly resulted in the number of mines declared being closed, but, it wasn’t even the vast majority of them, today many of those ‘illegal mines’ are still being worked.
“BEIJING - The country's work safety authorities have vowed to crack down on coal mine accident cover-ups, which are now rampant in the industry.
The Work Safety Committee under the State Council, revealed in a statement on Friday the attempts to cover-up six major coal mine accidents that killed a total of 42 miners since April.
Five of the accidents were investigated after local work safety departments received tip-offs, while the other was reported to the safety watchdog after a day's delay.
The cover-ups included removing the dead miners' bodies from mines and forging the miners' shift logs.
Covering up mine accidents is a crime in China, which usually leads to jail terms of up to seven years and the committee said it will supervise the handling of all the six cases by local governments.
Cover-ups of coal mine accidents are said to be common in Southwest China's Yunnan province, Xinhua News Agency reported over the weekend.”
Extract from;
www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2011-05/09/content_12467140.htm