Gilbert Hyatt Sues the USPTO Director Under Section 145 for a Patent on 270 Claims of His '203 Application.

The parties and the court

The case is Hyatt v. Squires, No. 1:26-cv-03198 (E.D. Va.), filed September 28, 2026. The docket shows the case assigned to Judge Michael S. Nachmanoff and referred to Magistrate Judge Ivan D. Davis. The defendant is John A. Squires, Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, sued in his official capacity only. The complaint describes Hyatt as an engineer, scientist, and inventor who has obtained more than 70 issued patents, and says he is 88 years of age and resides in Clark County, Nevada. Jurisdiction is pleaded under 28 U.S.C. 1331 and 1338(a) and 35 U.S.C. 145, and venue under 28 U.S.C. 1391(e) and 35 U.S.C. 145. The complaint says it is timely under 35 U.S.C. 145 and 37 CFR 90.3(a)(3)(i) and that the matter has not been appealed to the Federal Circuit.

The application and the claims

The complaint says Hyatt is the owner and inventor of Application No. 08/465,203, filed June 5, 1995, which it says has the benefit of the June 15, 1983 filing date of Application No. 06/504,691. Hyatt seeks a patent on 270 claims (claims 28, 31, 98-168, 175-181, 183, 185, 187-238, 240-276, 278-281, 283, 284, 286-323, 325-336, 339-342, 344-346, 348-375, and 378-385) and on no other claims in the application.

The complaint says the claims are generally directed to one of two kinds of subject matter. The first is outputting data link information onto a data link coupled to a remote location and performing specified operations, both based on hierarchical information that is in turn based on information communicated over a data link from a remote location, location information from a navigation system, information from a video camera, and database information accessed from a memory using database memory management operations, without recitation of non-volatile memory or infrared. The second is performing specified operations based on multi-level information using three types of information per level, or on information generated by multi-loop iteration using multiple speeds, multiple precisions, or whole number information by incremental processing, without recitation of relational, video camera, or link. The complaint says each claim has ascertainable differences in scope from the claims of Hyatt's co-pending applications.

Prosecution history in the complaint

The complaint says the application is governed by the transitional rules of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act, including 37 CFR 1.129(a), which limits an applicant to two submissions for further limited examination, and that it is a "special" application to be advanced out of turn under 37 CFR 1.102(a) and MPEP 708.01. It alleges Hyatt never made a dilatory filing, that the PTO suspended prosecution at least six times between May 2007 and September 2011 and entered new grounds of rejection as late as March 2020, and that the PTO subjected his applications to the Sensitive Application Warning System from at least the late 1990s through 2015.

It alleges that the PTO took no action on the merits for more than four years after a March 1997 response and for more than ten and a half years after a February 2003 Rule 129(a) submission; that in October 2013 the PTO issued a "Requirement" asking Hyatt to select 600 claims for examination across the applications of the "450 Family"; that Hyatt responded in March 2014; and that after an October 2018 final rejection and an April 2019 Rule 129(a) submission, the PTO issued a final rejection in March 2020. Hyatt appealed in August 2020, filed his appeal brief in March 2021, received the examiner's answer in January 2024, and filed a reply brief in May 2024. The complaint alleges that the PTO's failure to send an examiner's answer within six months violated a commitment the PTO made to the court in Hyatt v. PTO, No. 1:14-cv-01300 (E.D. Va.). It says that on July 27, 2026, the Board affirmed the rejection of each of the 270 claims on at least one ground. The complaint also alleges a decades-long PTO campaign against Hyatt's applications and says the PTO acted in bad faith.

The rejections Hyatt challenges

• Written description: claims 181 and 196 were rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, first paragraph. The complaint alleges the disclosure shows possession of each as of the effective filing date.
• Prosecution laches: all 270 claims were rejected and the application held forfeited. The complaint alleges prosecution laches is not a valid ground of rejection, particularly for an application subject to the two-submission limit, and alleges that Hyatt did not delay, that any delay is attributable to the PTO, that the PTO gave no advance warning of forfeiture, that it made no sufficient showing of intervening rights, that it unreasonably delayed in asserting laches, and that it has unclean hands.
• Undue multiplicity: all 270 claims were rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, second paragraph. The complaint alleges each claim informs with reasonable certainty about its scope.
• Obviousness: claim 181 was rejected over Fleishman (U.S. Patent 4,232,313), Tugaye (U.S. Patent 4,476,494), and Carr, "Geometric Modeling" (1969), and claim 196 over Fleishman, Drohan (U.S. Patent 3,715,594), and Mecklenborg (U.S. Patent 4,205,224), under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 103.
• Objections: the complaint says the PTO also objected to the specification and drawings and alleges they comply with the law.

The relief sought

The single count seeks issuance of a patent under 35 U.S.C. 145. The prayer asks for decrees that Hyatt is entitled to a patent on the 270 claims, that the rejections are erroneous, authorizing the Director to issue the patent, and that the specification and drawings comply with the law, plus other relief.

Earlier Hyatt section 145 litigation

In Hyatt v. Hirshfeld, 998 F.3d 1347 (Fed. Cir. 2021), the Federal Circuit held that the PTO can assert prosecution laches in a section 145 action, vacated district court judgments for Hyatt in four section 145 actions on other applications he filed in the months before June 8, 1995, held that the PTO had shown unreasonable and unexplainable delay, and remanded on prejudice. After a bench trial of nearly three weeks, the District of Columbia district court (Senior Judge Royce C. Lamberth) entered judgment for the PTO. On August 29, 2025, in Hyatt v. Stewart, Nos. 2018-2390 et al., the Federal Circuit affirmed that judgment on prosecution laches, held that law of the case foreclosed Hyatt's arguments that the defense is unavailable in a section 145 action, and affirmed that the district court lacked Article III jurisdiction over certain pending claims. The Supreme Court denied certiorari on June 29, 2026 (No. 25-1049) and denied rehearing on September 4, 2026.

On October 19, 2026, Hyatt filed a separate section 145 action against the Director on Application No. 08/461,572, Hyatt v. Squires, No. 1:26-cv-03481 (E.D. Va.).

What to watch next

Watch for the Director's answer or Rule 12 motion and the scheduling order, and whether the Director relies on Hyatt v. Stewart on prosecution laches.