Case ID: f_92/html/1021-05.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "PER CURIAM.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

PECK, STOW & WILCOX CO. v. FRAY et al.
    (Circuit Court of Appeals. Second Circuit.
    November 15, 1898.)
    Patknts — Injunction.
    Appeal from the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Connecticut.
    This causo comes here upon appeal from a preliminary order of injunction made by the circuit court, district o-C Connecticut. The patent Is No. 293,957 (February 19, 1884, to Robert E. Ellrich), for an improved pawl and ratchet, the claims declared upon being Nos. 2 and 3.
    A. M. Wooster, for appellants.
    W. E. Simonds, for appellee.
    Before WALLACE and LACOMBE, Circuit Judges.
   PER CURIAM.

It would seem that the patent, if sustainable at all, must

be construed as an extremely narrow one. Manifestly, defendant’s device is not a Chinese copy of complainant’s, and appellant has introduced sufficient evidence of the prior art, as disclosed in patents, to overcome the presumption arising from the issuance of the patent, — at least, if it he construed so broadly •as to cover defendant’s device, which can he done only by a liberal application ■of the doctrine of equivalents. The patent lias never been adjudicated, and its construction upon ex parte papers is too doubtful to warrant the issue of a preliminary injunction. The order for preliminary injunction (88 Fed. 784; is reversed, with costs of this appeal.