BECKLEY, W.Va. — A union election at Peabody Energy’s Brody Mine in Boone County was frozen Wednesday by the National Labor Relations Board amid formal complaints by the United Mine Workers of America the mine owner violated federal organizing statutes.

Gary Muffley, the NLRB’s region 9 director, said the election would be “canceled pending investigation of the unfair labor practice charge.”

Federal labor law violations were alleged this week by the UMWA in its organizing effort at a contractor operating the Brody Mine.

“The actions of the company in this election crossed the line, even in the eyes of the NLRB,” UMWA President Cecil Roberts said in a statement from his office.

Roberts interpreted the agency’s speedy response to his complaint that “there is evidence that the company so polluted the election process at this mine that it will be impossible to hold a free and fair election at this time.”

An effort was made to reach Peabody for comment, but no one answered a call placed at the Brody mine.

The election had been planned for Thursday, but Roberts complained earlier that violations were so severe that any election would be tainted.

In his complaint, Roberts accused the firm of instigating violence and other illegal acts in a “plot” to make the union look responsible.

“At least one worker has been used by the company as a plant within our organizing campaign,” the union leader said.

“He later ‘renounced’ his support for the union after he was fired for sleeping on the job and made false and misleading statements about the union.”

Last week, Roberts said, the same unidentified employee threatened union members, staff and their spouses outside a Beckley hotel to trigger a response while “a ‘union avoidance lawyer’ was hiding in the darkness of the hotel parking lot with a video camera.”

Police were called and a confrontation never occurred, Roberts said.

Open less than a year, the Brody Mine employs about 175 miners.





Mannix Porterfield writes for The Register-Herald in Beckley, W.Va.