Appeal No. 2004-1114 Page 6
Application No. 10/079,706
means-plus-function language is that statutorily mandated in paragraph six.
Accordingly, the USPTO may not disregard the structure disclosed in the specification
corresponding to such language when rendering a patentability determination. Thus,
we construe the "means for aligning an operating handle of the lockset" to cover the
finger 40 of the stop plate 20 which is configured to engage slot 28 of the sleeve 14
which is intended to be coupled to an operating handle and we construe the "means for
eliminating rotational movement of the operating handle about a longitudinal axis of the
lockset" to cover the plurality of resilient arms 36 extending from the center section 46
of the stop plate 20 and out of the plane of the center section.
In our view, the stop plate of claim 1 is clearly shown and described in the
appellants' drawings and specification as to enable one skilled in this art to make and
use the claimed invention. Accordingly, the decision of the examiner to reject claims 1
to 4 under 35 U.S.C. § 112, first paragraph, is reversed.2
The anticipation rejection
In the final rejection (pp. 3-4), the examiner set forth her rationale as to why
claims 1 to 4 and 6 were anticipated by Hart under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b).
2 Since the stop plate of claim 1 is clearly shown in the appellants' drawings, the examiner's
objection to the drawings under 37 CFR § 1.83(a) for not showing every feature set forth in claim 1 is
clearly in error.
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