DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Information Disclosure Statement
1. The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 11/09/2023 has been considered by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
2. 35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
3. Claims 1-4, 6, 8-12, 14-18 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. The claims recite a metal process. This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. The following reasons are provided to evaluate subject matter eligibility.
(1) Are the claims directed to a process, machine, manufacture or composition of matter;
(2A) Prong One: Are the claims directed to a judicially recognized exception, i.é., a law of nature, a natural phenomenon, or an abstract idea;
Prong Two: If the claims are directed to a judicial exception under Prong One, then is the judicial exception integrated into a practical application;
(2B) If the claims are directed to a judicial exception and do not integrate the judicial exception, do the claims provide an inventive concept.
With regard to (1), the analysis is a ‘yes’, claim 1 recites a machine, claim 9 recites a process and claim 15 recites a manufacture.
With regard to (2A) Prong One, the analysis is a “yes”. Claims 1, 9 and 15 recites “estimate, based on the site situation information, a feature of an involved person of an event that occurred at the site; compute a feature difference being a difference between the estimated feature of the involved person and a feature of a target person; and output the feature difference”. When viewed under the broadest most reasonable interpretation the claim recites an abstract idea of mental processes. The steps of “estimating” and “computing” is generically recited because there is no description of how this is accomplished. It can be interpreted as merely looking at the data such as an image or video, and evaluating the data in the mind, and describing it. The concepts, as claimed, are observations and/or evaluations (“analyze...”), judgements (“identify...” and “compare...”), and opinions (“determine, obtaining...”). There is nothing in the claim that requires more than an operation that a human, armed with the appropriate apparatus, pen/paper, can perform. One can perform the process using pen and paper, and the recitation of processor and memory in the system/device claim is a mere use of generic computer components. See MPEP 2106.04 and the 2019 PEG.
With regard to (2A) Prong Two: the analysis is a “No”. Claims 1, 9 and 15 recites the additional elements of “acquire site situation information indicating a situation of a site”; and these additional elements represents mere data gathering and indexing the data all together that is necessary for use of the recited abstract idea. Therefore, the limitation(s) is/are insignificant extra-solution activity, as transforming data into vector(s) is a generic operation. See MPEP 2106.05(1). The claim as a whole, looking at the additional elements individually and in combination, does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application.
With regard to (2B): the pending claims do not show what is more than a routine in the art presented in the claims, i.e., the additional elements are nothing more than routine and well-known steps. The additional elements do not reflect an improvement to a technology or technical field, including the use of a particular machine or particular transformation. It has not been shown that the mental process allows the “technology” to do something that it previously was not able to do.
Claims 2-4, 6, 8, 10-12, 14, 16-18 and 20 are similarly rejected for the same reasons as claims 1, 9 and 15. Dependent claims 2-4, 6, 8, 10-12, 14, 16-18 and 20 do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. The claims are rejected for the same reasons and not repeated herewith.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
4. In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
5. The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a) (1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
6. Claim(s) 1-4, 9-12 and 15-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Wood et al, 2019, “A Recommendation engine to Aid in Identifying Crime Patterns” (pp. 1-11).
Regarding claim 1, Wood discloses “A processing apparatus comprising:
at least one memory configured to store one or more instructions; and at least one processor configured to execute the one or more instructions (page 8 – left column – 3rd para – Officers and analysts can access Patternizr through the custom software application, which is a part of DAS on NYPD desktop computers – where memory and processor are inherent components of a computer) to:
acquire site situation information indicating a situation of a site (page 2 – left column – “We used a separate model for each of three different crime types (burglaries, robberies and grand larcenies) because these crime types have a sufficient corpus of prior manually identified patterns for use as training examples”; page 2 – right column – “a compliant contains a mix of unstructured text describing details of the crime and structured fields about the crime, including the date and time, location, crime subcategory, M.O., and suspect information”; page 4 – left column - last para – “Much of the information in a complaint is in categorical form, including premise type, crime classification, the M.O. itself, weapon type, and details about crime’s location. Other information is stored in categorical field that have yes/no/unknown structures; examples include whether a firearm was discharged during the crime, whether the crime was attempted or completed, whether someone required medical assistance, an whether the crime was domestic in nature”; page 4 – right column – Topic – Suspect features – “the categorical feature of force used, in commission of a robbery”; page 9 – left column – last paragraph - “examining the theft of a watch from a locker at a hotel gym in Midtown Manhattan in the late afternoon...jewelry and watches were removed from a locker in a fitness facility in the late afternoon or early evening in the same area”;
estimate, based on the site situation information, a feature of an involved person of an event that occurred at the site (page 1 – right column – 2nd para – “Evidence from the legal system and criminological research indicates that many of these crimes were committed by the same criminal-is known as a pattern. The crimes in a pattern may be nearby in space, similar in times and days of occurrence, and (or) alike in method (also known as the modus operandi, or (M.O.). Once a pattern has been identified, it is possible for police to use evidence from related crimes to more easily identify and apprehend the perpetrator”; page 3- left column – “Suspect descriptions are particularly useful in identifying patterns in violent crimes such as robberies because, in such crimes, the victim physically encounters the suspect”; page 9 – left column – last paragraph – “the algorithm likely recognized similarities in the complaint’s times of occurrence, their geographic proximity, the property removed (jewelry and watches), the premise types (gyms), and key words in the narrative (e.g., locker). Two suspects were identified through the review of video footage” – where identification/estimation of suspect features are inherently needed here to identify the involved person; see page 4 – right column – Topic – Suspect features – suspect attributes, including height, weight, force used are used; further see page 10 – right column – Suspect Height and Weight Attributes; and Suspect Force used).
compute a feature difference being a difference between the estimated feature of the involved person and a feature of a target person and output the feature difference (see page 4 – right column – Topic – Suspect features – Suspect attribute comparison must be made between all possible pairs of individuals, further also including the force used is matched; page 10 - right column - Suspect Height and Weight Attributes; and Suspect Force used were compared and the similarity was outputted; further see Table 1 on page 3 with respect to suspect feature comparison).
Regarding claim 2 , Wood discloses “The processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the feature of the target person includes at least one of a feature of a person arrested in connection with the event that occurred at the site, a feature of a suspect of the event that occurred at the site, a feature of a reference person of the event that occurred at the site, and a feature of a person indicated by witness information collected in connection with the event that occurred at the site” (see page 4 – right column – Topic – Suspect features – suspect attributes, including height, weight, force used are used; page 3- left column – “Suspect descriptions are particularly useful in identifying patterns in violent crimes such as robberies because, in such crimes, the victim physically encounters the suspect”).
Regarding claim 3, Wood discloses “The processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the feature of the involved person and the feature of the target person include at least one of race, nationality, culture, religion, age, gender, a height, a weight, a lung capacity, a body fat percentage, a limb length, a limb weight, a dominant hand, a dominant foot, and clothing.” (see page 4 – right column – Topic – Suspect features – suspect attributes, including height, weight, force used are used).
Regarding claim 4, Wood discloses “The processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the site situation information includes at least one of a captured image of the site, an illustration depicting a situation of the site, and a text depicting a situation of the site” (page 9 – left column – last paragraph - “examining the theft of a watch from a locker at a hotel gym in Midtown Manhattan in the late afternoon...jewelry and watches were removed from a locker in a fitness facility in the late afternoon or early evening in the same area, the algorithm likely recognized similarities in the complaint’s times of occurrence, their geographic proximity, the property removed (jewelry and watches), the premise types (gyms), and key words in the narrative (e.g., locker). Two suspects were identified through the review of video footage).
Regarding claim 9, claim 9 has been similarly analyzed and rejected as per citations made in the rejection of claim 1.
Regarding claim 10, claim 10 has been similarly analyzed and rejected as per citations made in the rejection of claim 2.
Regarding claim 11, claim 11 has been similarly analyzed and rejected as per citations made in the rejection of claim 3.
Regarding claim 12, claim 12 has been similarly analyzed and rejected as per citations made in the rejection of claim 4.
Regarding claim 15, claim 15 has been similarly analyzed and rejected as per citations made in the rejection of claim 1.
Regarding claim 16, claim 16 has been similarly analyzed and rejected as per citations made in the rejection of claim 2.
Regarding claim 17, claim 17 has been similarly analyzed and rejected as per citations made in the rejection of claim 3.
Regarding claim 18, claim 18 has been similarly analyzed and rejected as per citations made in the rejection of claim 4.
Claims 5, 7, 13 and 19 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MANAV SETH whose telephone number is (571)272-7456. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday to Friday from 8:30 am to 5:00 pm.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner's supervisor, Sumati Lefkowitz, can be reached on (571) 272-3638. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/MANAV SETH/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2672 January 30, 2026