The factory director must have been overly confident, thinking no one would come to check, and since so many years had passed, no one paid attention to these things anymore. Who would care about a factory that had ceased production and showed no sign of hope? These things were already useless. Even if someone took over, they would just inventory the existing assets and then conduct an audit.
Too many past incidents were unexplainable, which was typical of the old state enterprise style; bygone affairs generally weren't scrutinized because everyone had something to hide. What's more, considering it was already a nonperforming asset, a burdensome factory?