Beach Robo, Inc., Hilltop Shell, Inc., Intervening v. Crown Central Petroleum, Inc

DONALD RUSSELL, Circuit Judge:

The plaintiff, an owner and operator of a gasoline station in Virginia Beach, Virginia, seeks an injunction against the defendant, a “producer and refiner” of gasoline, forbidding the latter from operating a filling station less than a mile and a half from its station in violation of the Virginia Petroleum Products Franchise Act, Virginia Code Section 59.1-21.8 through 21.18:1 and for statutory damages. The Act on which the plaintiff relies has a “grandfather” clause exempting from its prohibitions “retail outlets operated by producers or refiners on July 1,…