Monster Protection Racket

A type of con where the giant monster attacking local villages ultimately turns out to be the property (or at least in the employ) of the very same hunters who conveniently showed up to exterminate it (for a nominal reward).

Before the culprit's racket is revealed, it seems like there's going to be an Always Someone Better plot. If the scammer is the protagonist, he will soon have to face the real thing and become a true hero. Either way, it's a common karmic punishment for this character to encounter the real thing, sometimes thinking it's his own hoax used against him. The real thing is usually none too impressed with the imposter, and doesn't hesitate to show him what it's really capable of.

In Superhero stories, leaving aside conventional crimes, nothing will disgust the members of a superhero team/community more than catching one of their own pulling this scam. Someone would likely say "You mean you endangered innocent people for a self-aggrandizing publicity stunt!?" just before they dropkick the offender out of their organization.

Subtrope of Engineered Heroics.

Anime and Manga

 * In Claymore, villages that don't pay out after Claymores kill their yoma infestations are coincidentally overrun by yoma shortly thereafter. Huh. The Claymores are innocent of this, but some start wising up later on in the manga.
 * An example without monsters: in an episode of Full Metal Panic Fumoffu, the martial arts club has 3 of their members pretend to be thugs and the other defeat them to impress girls. It works rather well... until the girls all meet and compare notes.
 * The debut of Tien and Chiaotzu in Dragonball has them freeing some villages from a boar monster that they own, until Goku finds out and stops them.
 * A variation of this is the bulk of the short manga Monsters by Eiichiro Oda (author of One Piece), where the villains uses a magical horn to summon a giant dragon to raze the cities (so that they can pillage them).
 * Early on in Inuyasha, Miroku and Hachiemon the tanuki do this, with Hachiemon using his Shapeshifting abilities to become the "monster".

Comic Books

 * Hank Pym did this with a robot (first) in the The Avengers comic book when he was on his downhill slide; naturally, the situation got out of hand when he was knocked hors de combat. No one remembers this because he also hit his wife.
 * El Hombre attempts this in the Astro City arc "The Tarnished Angel". As part of his backstory, he hired one of his foes to create a giant robot to go on a rampage that he would then stop and restore his falling fame. The foe double-crossed him and did not include the agreed upon off-switch, forcing other superheroes to come in and stop the menace for real as well as expose El Hombre's scam. (This is almost certainly a homage to the Hank Pym story described above.).
 * The short-lived Sentinel miniseries had its protagonist, who had become The Kid With the Remote Control to one of the titular Humongous Mecha, successfully pulling this on his high school (after teasing a more traditional Roaring Rampage of Revenge). Despite his newfound popularity and a distinct lack of casualties, he still has a My God What Have I Done moment afterwards.
 * Used in Jeff Smith's Bone series. One of the characters starts stirring up rumors about dragons in the region, and gets an entire town to give him their gold and treasure as "bait" so that he can "trap" a dragon. His actual plan is to get as much gold as he can, then skip town when people get too suspicious. It blows up in his face when an actual dragon the characters met before intentionally jumps into the trap and refuses to escape.
 * The fame obsessed Booster Gold pulls a version of this in 52, hiring an actor to play a supervillain so he can save the day. He gets busted for it, naturally.
 * He gained a rep for this from his time with the JLI and Conglomorate (see below)
 * A Golden Age Batman story had an ex-gangster using his underworld contacts to track down wanted criminals so he could capture them and turn them in for the reward. When he ran out of wanted criminals, he started busting crooks out of prison so he could capture them and turn them in.
 * Max Lord, when he was running Justice League International, and his ex-wife Clare Montgomary of the Conglomorate, both have a habit of faking or hiring villains to make "their guys" look good (and in Claire's case because her corporate sponsers don't want the team fighting real villains without their control). In a variation, the teams themselves don't (usually) realise this, and think they're genuinely fighting the villains.

Film

 * The main human character in Dragonheart pulls this on a few towns with the help of the dragon he befriended. Dragon flies over, sets fire to a few thatched-roof cottages, and scares some livestock. Hero shows up with a gigantic ballista and downs the dragon in a bolt, where it splashes down in a lake (in fact having caught the bolt safely under one arm, and escaped under the cover of water). This eventually backfires (hilariously) when the dragon lands in a lake that's too shallow for him to submerge in: The starving villagers rush the dragon while chanting "meat!", but after the dragon escapes (betraying the ruse) the villagers turn on the protagonists and start chanting "meat"...
 * Interesting point with this one is that the protagonist here actually was the real thing. The only reason he and the dragon started this little racket was because he had run out of dragons to kill; the one he's working with is the last, and by working together in this way the hunter gets to keep his job and the dragon gets to live.
 * In Peter Jackson's The Frighteners, Michael J. Fox's character makes a living by having his ghost friends "haunt" houses before arriving to "exorcise" them.
 * The Ghostbusters had to face accusations of this, in the movies at least. Venkman actually does pretend to detect paranormal activity in Dana's apartment, although he's faking it to get into her pants rather than her wallet.
 * This is the profession that The Brothers Grimm are in before they encounter real supernatural entities.
 * Syndrome planned to pull this off in The Incredibles, but his robot outsmarted him.
 * The entirety of the Star Wars prequels, and therefore the backdrop to all Prequel-era Expanded Universe works as well. Then-Chancellor Palpatine secretly funds and directs the Confederacy only to justify turning the Republic into the Empire and so he can frame the Jedi. A rare case where the plan goes off without a hitch, with the Confederacy being destroyed only after Palpatine becomes Emperor.
 * The Beast of Gévaudan in Brotherhood of the Wolf..

Literature

 * In the first of the Saga of the Noble Dead series, the protagonists fake vampire attacks for a living and pretend to slay them. Then they encounter real vampires.
 * The short story The George Business by Roger Zelazny (possibly an influence on Dragonheart per The Other Wiki) ends with the dragon and George deciding to go into this business together.
 * Most fiction parodying/deconstructing The Pied Piper of Hamelin.
 * This is a regular con that Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents pull: rats show up and mess with things in incredibly visible ways. Town hires a piper, who is usually some kid and his pet cat (legitimate pipers are hideously expensive and prissy). Kid leads out all the rats in showy fashion. Kid gets paid. Kid leaves town and meets up with rats to count up and split the profits. (The meeting up with the real thing is also played straight, in fact, it is the main plot of the book.)
 * It was revealed that the real pipers pull a version of this: they started the stories about horrible retributions for not paying them. It also points out he plot hole in the original: rats can swim, and will work their way back to provide future employment.
 * Earlier in the Discworld series, the human villain of Guards! Guards! had tried to use a one-shot version of this scheme to get a (figurehead) king installed as the ruler of Ankh-Morpork. It backfired, because the dragon he summoned as part of the plan turned out to have ambitions of its own....
 * At another point in the Discworld series, there's an anecdote about people attempting the "pest" version of this when Ankh-Morpork was in the throes of a rat infestation and people were being paid per rat. Lord Vetinari was asked what should be done, and replied simply "Tax the rat farms."
 * The well-known Japanese story Naita Akaoni -- which roughly translates to "Crying Red Oni" or "Tears of the Red Oni" and is referenced in, among other things, Tokyo Godfathers and Keroro Gunsou -- features a Blue Oni that comes up with this scheme and acts as the monster in it, so his friend the Red Oni can befriend humans. In the Bittersweet Ending, Blue Oni has to leave forever to keep up the ruse.

Live Action TV

 * Parodied on Late Night With Conan O Brien, where a dog is shown to have a hero complex and creates situations to save people from. After being reprimanded by Conan, the dog looks shameful, but oh so cute...
 * Non-monster example: Big Wolf On Campus featured a Fake Ultimate Hero, Stormfront, who pulled this sort of scam by secretly engineering disasters, then showing up to stop them. For instance, pushing a baby carriage into traffic with a gust of wind, then rushing in and saving the baby.
 * Stargate Atlantis: Lucius Lavin did it in his second appearance, hiring former Genii soldiers to "attack" the town he was protecting. It Got Worse when he started to haggle after they had fulfilled their part of the contract...
 * Star Trek: The Next Generation - The Most Toys: Fajo uses this in a plot to fake Data's death in order to capture him.
 * Keeping Up Appearances: Hyacinth tries this on a golf course, with brother in law Onslow as the monster, ice cream executives as the audience, and her husband, Richard, as the ace. It doesn't work, because Coitus Ensues in the wrong place between Onslow and Daisy, and when the real threat shows up, Hyacinth herself performs much better as the ace. Hyacinth gets the job offer that she wanted Richard to have.

Radio

 * In the Doctor Who audio adventure "The One Doctor", a conman fakes alien invasions and then poses as the Doctor to defeat them. Then the real Doctor shows up, with hilarious consequences.

Real Life

 * Covertly introducing termites, rodents, or other vermin to a building, then "conveniently" showing up to provide fumigation services, is an old scam used by thieves to gain access to homes or other properties.
 * Also real-life dhampir professed to be half-vampire, were typically at least half-gypsy, and hunted vampires for money, food, goods, and any and all favors that a vulnerable community could provide. And the myth that only a dhampir can see an invisible vampire seems to be invented specifically for this sort of scam...
 * Some malware will pretend to be an anti-malware program and alert the user that the computer is infected with tons of viruses. Then they'll charge money to make the "viruses" go away while providing no actual protection to the computer. They can usually be detected by being massively more obnoxious than any legitimate defensive program.

Tabletop Games

 * The Ravenloft supplement Van Richten's Arsenal mentions the existence of charlatan "monster hunters" who prey on villagers' fears, faking signs of a werebeast or similar menace in the area, then showing up to "heroically" defend them. Often, their "proof" of victory consists of displaying the head of a dead (mundane) wolf or other predator they've killed as a scapegoat.
 * A Dragon Magazine "Dragon Project" article (unusual dragons for games other than D&D; in this case GURPS) describes Dexter and Cornelius, a conman who works with a naive dragon. Cornelius "threatens" a village, and Dexter arrives to "save" it.

Video Games

 * The main character gets accused of this in Dragon Quest V - he goes out to slay a beast terrorizing a farming village, only to find it's his old animal companion driven feral after he was taken into slavery for ten years. The villagers assume this is being pulled on them because they don't know the backstory, and they strongly hint that you should move on. One townsperson (a sweet, grandmotherly old woman) does realize he didn't actually do it, but still suggests he should move on as convincing the others that he's innocent will be impossible.
 * In Okage: Shadow King, the Chairman Evil King started a rumor that the heroes' guild was pulling this sort of scam with the ghosts. It's doubtful that they were, though.
 * Jak II features a variation. The Metal Heads are legitimately a hostile invading force interested in destroying Haven City... but given the choice, they'd rather just lay low until they can do so, or at least do some real damage -- the Gaiden Game Daxter covers one such attempt, disguised as a bug infestation to avoid alerting anyone before it's too late. The Krimzon Guard bribes them to make periodic ineffectual attacks so they can justify their brutal, fascist rule as necessary in the face of this threat.
 * In Episode 2 of Phantom Brave, Walnut falsely claims that Marona was running one of these, using her powers to summon evil phantoms to Windmill Promontory and then getting rid of them so she'd get paid for it. It's a lie, but given how hated and distrusted people with Marona's powers are, the person who hired her believes it without question and pays Walnut instead for the work she did. And this is after his plan to just kill her and take the credit that way falls through. Jerkass doesn't even begin to describe it.
 * Suikoden V has do this with bandits rather than monsters. As an added bonus, the bandit leader was a look alike for the protagonist, adding an extra dividend to the plot.
 * Might and Magic V features this in the game's very first quest, in a city full of giant man-eating bugs. An exterminator has spent years getting paid to "work on the problem," while actually having the bugs shipped in from elsewhere.
 * In Final Fantasy X,.
 * In a roundabout way, this is how
 * In City of Heroes, it's speculated that this may be why the architect of the Rikti War provoked the Rikti, but he underestimated them. Although with him, you never know.
 * The protagonists in Fear Is Vigilance decide to help their campaign to distribute free personal alarms by scaring the students into asking for them -- by beating them up every night.

Web Comics
"...And before you say "I don't need dinosaur insurance", and "get off my lawn", I think there's something you should frickin' come out here and see!"
 * Franz Rainer from The Adventures of Dr. McNinja tried this with synthetic ninjas on steroids as the monster and the people of the USA as the audience.
 * Dragon Mango: The Dragonslayers do this. With the added twist that
 * Minions At Work cuts some corners in Minions #318 - Sales Forced.

Western Animation

 * In Ben 10 Alien Force, Mike Morningstar/Darkstar's first appearance has him bluffing his way onto the Plumber team by driving away zombies he made with his own energy-stealing power.
 * In Ben 10 there was an ex-plumber who made a scam by releasing imprison aliens from the null void and offers his services at a price.
 * The Powerpuff Girls had this with a fake superhero called Major Man. It turned out he was setting up disasters, crimes, and even monster attacks so he could pretend to save the day and it would look as if the Girls weren't needed anymore..
 * Danny Phantom during the Grand Finale had the Masters' Blasters, a trio of teenage ghost hunters who does a better job fighting ghosts then The Hero Danny does. This is all tied to Vlad's secret plot to ruin Danny's reputation. Though the Trio later charges in exchange for their services. Could count as somewhat of an inversion, since it was the monster (Vlad) hiring the heroes. Notably, the Blasters didn't seem to realize their boss' secret either.
 * The end of the second season of Justice League starts with a convenient save by the Thanagarians as they shoot down a Gordanian scouter when it tried to invade the White House. The Thanagarians claim they can protect Earth from future invasions if Earth offers no resistance in their occupation. Batman, crazy paranoid as usual, realizes the Gordanian pilot was dead long before entering Earth's atmosphere.
 * Dudley Do Right featured a mundane variation of this trope in one episode. In his latest scheme against the Mounties, Snidely Whiplash forms his own competing Mounties. They always got their man and made the regular Mounties look like a bunch of incompetents. However, all the captures made by the Snidely Mounties are staged since Snidely controls the local criminal element.
 * X Men Evolution did this with the Brotherhood who, deciding to try the hero thing out, saved a train from a disaster and was rewarded with fame and fortune by a thankful rescuee. They then try to be heroes to get the rewards, but when they run out of people to save they get greedy and desperate for more, eventually starting disasters of their own so they can get the recognition for saving the day. This blows up spectacularly, of course, and they lose all their luxuries (including the ones they got for legitimate work).
 * Ren and Stimpy attempt this in "The Boy Who Cried Rat." The results aren't pretty.