I believe the term people are trying to come up with is "gouging".

The State of Maryland or Montgomery County passed a then recent anti-gouging law when the gas prices started getting very volatile a few years ago.

The government indicted a small non-franchised gas station owner who was charging nearly twice the rate for gas as "everyone else" within a pretty wide area (mid-five dollar range, as I recall).

The owner's excuse was that he was planning to go on vacation for a couple weeks which meant that the station would be shut down during that time, not making any money, and he wanted to make the money ahead of the trip by selling gas at a higher rate.

That was open advertisement of the rate being charged, and potential customers had the choice to drive to another station with a different price, but he was still charged by the state for gouging.

Unfortunately I don't have the follow-up to this story--what the verdict was.

Steve32