Court Opinion

ID: 9450035
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 16:33:17.374949+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:32:07.451944
License: Public Domain

RICH, J., with whom SMITH, J.,
joins, dissenting in part:
The invention here sought to be patented is described in the specification as an improvement in a known type of syringe. The improvement is in the use of a “retractible barbed or spearpoint head” on the old inner plunger rod which will hook into the “piston cork” of the disposable ampoule or cartridge, “converting the conventional disposable cartridge into an aspirating cartridge,” (my emphasis) by which it is meant that the piston cork can be pulled back as well as pushed forward.
The cited references show that others had addressed themselves to the same problem or desideratum and had devised means by which the cork could be retracted by the syringe plunger. Pontius did it with a complex and expensive three-jaw and cam arrangement wherein three jaws are propelled out of the plunger head on curved paths toward the axis of the cork. “When these claw-like hooks are moved forward, their tips meet above the center of the plunger head.” Breitenbach has a head with two short claws acting like corkscrews and requiring a twisting movement of the plunger rod to engage it with the cork. Hein has an entirely different system involving the use of a specially formed cork with a cylindrical collar on it and is not relied on for its cork-engaging structure. Effenberger does not relate to syringes at all.
The patentable subject matter disclosed in appellant’s application as the one improvement appellant says he invented is the use of the barbed or spear-point head to hook onto the cork. The Patent Office has found that a patentable invention is disclosed by the allowance of claims 12, 13, and 14. Insofar as the appealed claims are directed to the same improvement and so define it as to distinguish it from the references they, too,, should be allowed.
It appears to me that appellant has devised a very simple, effective, easily operated aspirating connection which is not. shown in the references relied on. The Patent Office position is that it would have been obvious to those skilled in the syringe art to modify the syringe structures of Pontius and Breitenbach by using a spearpoint connection such as that, which it belatedly found in the 1904 patent to Effenberger by which a ring is permanently attached to a bottle cork to serve as a handle. Yet neither of the other syringe reference patentees, who filed in 1953 and 1955, found it obvious to use a barbed or spearpoint head. We hardly need look to Effenberger on this issue of obviousness considering the fact, of which we take judicial notice' because it is such common knowledge, that barbed fish-hooks and spearpoints (of the type commonly depicted throughout modern times on Wrigley’s gum wrappers) are older than the Christian era. If it was so obvious to use such a point, why did Pontius and Breitenbach go to such pains to devise more complex devices?
I am therefore of the view that it was not obvious to use a barbed or spear-point head, according to appellant’s invention, and that any claim which is limited to such a point is patentable. I find claim 2 is not so limited since it calls merely for piercing means capable of piercing the cork by a straight-line push on the plunger. Pontius meets this, though his jaws travel in curved paths.
Claim 3, however, calls for piercing means including a shoulder to be imbedded, which is a barb or spearpoint feature. Claim 4 is similarlv limited afid *893adds that the shoulder, while resisting extraction, will permit it. Claim 5 specifies “a fixed pointed barb” to be embedded in the cork. Claim 6 depends from 4 and adds that there is a pair of shoulders.
Claim 8 does not define the invention described since it calls only for a “penetrating point.”
Claim 9 specifies “barbed piercing means * * * for connection * * * with the cartridge cork” and uses further language implying that it is withdraw-able by a straight pull of sufficient force greater than that required for aspiration.
Claims 10 and 11 are like claim 2 in calling for “piercing means” broadly. Another feature of the disclosed structure is here relied on, namely a spring retracting the plunger, which I find is old in Hein, which is all Hein is cited for, and these claims do not define patentable subject matter.
Claim 12 stands allowed. It reads:
“12. An aspirating syringe comprising a generally cylindrical magazine, a plunger reciprocable longitudinally within said magazine, and a substantially flat aspirator hook rigidly fixed to the forward end of said plunger; said magazine being adapted to receive therein a cylindrical ampoule having a piston stopper slidable forwardly therein to expel a medicament therefrom and retracti-ble to afford aspiration, said hook having substantially similar opposite side faces approximately parallel to the line of reciprocal movement of the plunger; said hook being adapted to become embedded in said stopper without turning relatively thereto, and having a portion opposing its withdrawal from said stopper upon a retraction stroke of the plunger.” [Emphasis added.]
It shows, I think, that the specific hook shown in the drawings in the form of a flat-sided spear, even with one of the two shoulders omitted, is regarded as patentable invention by the Patent Office. While we are not bound by that decision, the unanimous decision of the three men on the board, reversing the examiner’s rejection of claims 12, 13, and 14, is certainly entitled to some weight. I think it is our proper function to try to promote some degree of consistency in pat-entability decisions and to reverse the rejection of claims limited to substantially the same subject matter as allowed claims where we do not disagree with such allowance. There is nothing in the flatness of the hook as recited in claims 12-14 to distinguish from the references since Effenberger’s spear is just as flat as appellant’s. If these claims define un-obvious subject matter, so do several others, and I think they do.
I cannot agree with the reasons on which the board based its affirmance of the rejection on Pontius and Breiten-bach. In the portion quoted by the majority, the board expressed the view that the “rearward surface” of the Pontius jaws “anticipates” the use of a barb or spearhead having shoulders for the reason that it resists withdrawal. This is merely saying that it anticipates because it accomplishes a similar result. We have recently had occasion to point out that this is legally bad reasoning. In re Scott, 323 F.2d 1016, 51 CCPA 747; In re Flint, 330 F.2d 363, 51 CCPA -. Structure is here being claimed and the structures are not the same.
The board further opined that since barbs are so common, it would be obvious “to place a barb on the Pontius pointed elements for the conventional purpose.” I think this is an absurd suggestion for several reasons. The Pontius structure, being in the nature of claws or talons gripping toward the center of the cork, need no barbs to perform their function. The use of barbs would make retraction of those talons extremely difficult, if not impossible, with his camming mechanism and would very likely render the device inoperative. The “corks” here are made of rubber or the like. Finally, even if barbs were placed on Pontius’ elements, appellant’s structure would not be produced.
Finally, I think the board’s reasoning with respect to the obviousness of em*894ploying barbs is entirely inconsistent when one compares what was said in rejecting claims 2-9 and in allowing claims 12-14. Choosing between the statements, the only one which makes sense and is in accord with the law is the latter, which reads:
“In combining references [including common knowledge] patentability •cannot be negatived merely by selecting from the prior art those features which can be synthesized into an anticipation once it is known what features should be selected. The Ef-fenberger device thus fails to supply the necessary feature which Pontius or Breitenbaeh alone does not possess, that is, the teaching of the deficiency and how to solve it.”
That reasoning must be anplied uniformly to all claims appealed.
I would reverse as to claims 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and affirm as to claims 2, 8, 9, 10 and 11.