Four indicted over 2021 fire cover-up at Illinois coal mine, DOJ says

Four men have been indicted on federal charges connected to a 2021 underground fire at the MC#1 Mine in Franklin County, Illinois, according to the Department of Justice.

Ronald Dale Koontz, 69, of Hendersonville, Tennessee; Demitrios George Macropoulos, 38, of Buckeye, Arizona; Randy L. Nowland, 67, of Waltonville, Illinois; and Cory Taylor Humphrey, 37, of Prospect, Kentucky, were named in an indictment returned Tuesday. The men are accused of conspiring to defraud the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration by concealing the fire and interfering with the agency’s subsequent investigation and administration of safety-related orders, according to the indictment.

The indictment alleges that the defendants kept miners underground and continued mining coal for all or portions of three shifts while unsuccessfully battling the fire, rather than evacuating the mine and notifying MSHA as required by mandatory safety standards under the Federal Mine Safety and Health Act. Nowland and Humphrey are additionally charged with falsifying required mine safety records, while Koontz and Macropoulos face obstruction charges for allegedly reentering the mine after MSHA ordered miners withdrawn. Koontz is also accused of directing another supervisor to delete a record of a telephone call he made.

A fifth alleged conspirator, former mine manager Brandon Timothy Parsons, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud MSHA on Aug. 28, 2025, in a related criminal proceeding filed that month, according to the Justice Department.

According to the indictment, the fire ignited on Aug. 13, 2021, while mine personnel used cutting torches to cut collapsed steel beams underground. When the fire could not be extinguished within 10 minutes, the defendants allegedly chose not to evacuate the mine or notify MSHA. Instead, they allegedly directed coal mining to continue during ad hoc firefighting efforts through the morning of Aug. 14.

That day, Parsons allegedly evacuated hourly employees under the false pretense that a conveyor belt used to carry coal from underground to the surface was broken. He and other alleged conspirators then went back underground to continue trying to fight the fire, according to the indictment.

MSHA received an anonymous tip and ordered the mine evacuated after inspectors confirmed the fire, according to the indictment. Despite that order, conspirators allegedly reentered the mine on two occasions over the next several days to assess the fire and manipulate underground conditions to fool gas detectors so that MSHA would allow mining to resume. One conspirator also allegedly encouraged another to dispose of a portable gas detector that MSHA was seeking as part of its investigation. That person allegedly concealed the detector away from the mine.

“As Congress has long recognized, a strong, productive coal industry depends on miners who feel safe and trust that their leaders are not putting them at unnecessary risk,” said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Adam Gustafson of the Justice Department’s Energy and Natural Resources Division.

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U.S. Attorney Steven D. Weinhoeft for the Southern District of Illinois said concealing dangerous conditions and covering up those actions “put lives at risk” and prevented federal authorities from doing the work required by law.

The case was investigated by the Department of Labor’s Office of Inspector General and the FBI. An indictment is merely an allegation. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.

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