Appeal No. 96-3189
Application 08/396,079
applications without allowing the present one to issue may
result in a future rejection based upon the equitable doctrine
of laches" [Paper no. 15, mailed on November 30, 1994, page
2]. In response, Appellants filed yet another file-wrapper-
continuation application, containing exactly the same claims 1
through 5 and 7 through 23, and new claims 24 through 59.
The Examiner finally rejected all the outstanding claims,
1 through 5 and 7 through 59 under the doctrine of laches,
claim 6 having been canceled back in the original '449
application. Even after the laches warning, Appellants never
did make any changes in the originally allowed claims 1
through 5 and 7 through 23, indicated to be allowed in the
'449, '159 and '558 applications. We find that this is a
specific fact situation that was not present in the other
cases as we have noted above.
Thus, we conclude that, as to the original claims 1
through 5 and 7 through 23, which were allowed by the Examiner
on August 26, 1993 in the original '449 application after
normal prosecution, and twice again indicated to be allowed in
each first office action, on April 6, 1994 in the '159
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