NATCHEZ — If Hurricane Gustav wasn’t bad enough, a storm of high gas prices is brewing around the Miss-Lou.

Many prices around town jumped to 3.79 per gallon, an increase of up to 20 cents per gallon, which has left many residents upset.

“It’s kind of interesting because (the hurricane hasn’t hit) yet,” Ron Chapman said. “I have a feeling it’s a little bit of anticipation by the oil company.”

Chapman is from Chalmette, La., near New Orleans, but has evacuated Gustav to his house in Natchez and remembers his 2005 evacuation to Natchez well.

“As Yogi Berra said, ‘It’s deja vu all over again.’ People are just realizing they’ve got to move and move fast.”

Ricky Barlow, who spent nearly $80 to fill up his truck, was also very upset.

“I think it’s ridiculous because they didn’t pay 20 cents more for it when it was in the ground,” Barlow said. “It was $3.59 two days ago. The same gas they paid a lower price for is still in the ground.

“It really hasn’t done anything to us yet. It’s just a gouge.”

And although Gustav has yet to make landfall, it has had an impact on the price that the stations are paying for the gas, said Charles Zuccaro of Independent Oil.

Independent Oil saw a price increase of 26 cents per gallon, which has been passed on to drivers, Zuccaro said.

“Demand and inventory numbers have a lot to do with it,” Zuccaro said. “The inventory numbers usually come out on Thursday and if the inventory is low then it goes back up.”

The increase in supplier price has cut into Independent Oil’s profit margin, Zuccaro said.

“We’re definitely not making what we normally make.”

And for the Mississippi Attorney General’s office, profit is the key component in fighting price gouging.

“The rule of thumb is very clear,” Attorney General Jim Hood said. “You cannot increase you profits.”

However, the misconception of many people is that the storm calls for a price freeze, Hood said. Stores are allowed to increase the prices to cover increases in the cost of fuel.

“Your local store, it cost them more, and you can’t ask them to sell fuel at a deficit,” Hood said.

However, some stores try to get around this rule.

“What some of them do though, is they’ll call ahead and find out that their next load is going to cost 25 cents a gallon more, and they’ll run out and change out the cost on the gas they have in the ground,” Hood said. “And that’s price gouging.”

And this is something that the Attorney General’s office is taking very seriously.

“We have sent the message out very clear, he said. If you price gouge over $500 it’s a felony and that’s subject to one to five years in the penitentiary.

If we catch them we’re going to try to send people to the pen, if I have anything to do with it.”

While they have been working very hard to stop price gouging, Hood said that consumers are the key to prosecuting it.

“Just about everybody’s got a camera on their cell phone,” he said. “Use that camera, a picture’s worth a 1,000 words in those criminal courts.”