PRINCE GEORGE’S COUNTY, Md. (WDVM) — Over the weekend, 11 churches came together to give away gas to the community. Still, organizers are now accusing one of the gas stations of taking advantage of their kind gesture.
Lines were up the street and around the corner at the Sunoco on Marlboro Pike in Forestville, MD, on Saturday. Anthony Tilghman volunteered to pump residents’ gas and videotaped the entire event. While looking back at his footage, he noticed the price was $5.09 when they arrived, then went back down to $4.99 as soon as they left.
“We should literally stop going here because that was disrespectful,” said Tilghman. “Our community coming together support residents especially in low income areas and then the gas station use this time to make profit.”
“That didn’t hurt us, we were gonna give the money anyway,” said Rev. Dr. Bobby Manning, Senior Pastor of first Baptist Church of District Heights. “It really hurt the people who were there. We’re gonna give you this amount of gas anyway. But if it’s more expensive that means you get less in your tank.”
An employee at the Sunoco provided WDVM with the owner’s number. We called the number multiple times, but was sent straight to voicemail. Pastor Manning says the owner gave him a call on Monday, but he had yet to return his call.
While the organizers hopes the gas station will be penalized, we reached out to the Attorney General’s office who wrote in a statement, “unfortunately, there is no law prohibiting price gouging in MD. Our office has tried for many years, including this last legislative session, to get one through the general assembly but so far efforts have been unsuccessful.”
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