Stearns

Appellants sued appellees in the United States Court, Southern District of California, Central Division, charging by their Second Amended Complaint that appellees had infringed claims 1 and 7 of United States Letters Patent No. 2,332,182 1 (hereinafter “the Stearns patent”), and praying for an injunction, an accounting, and damages. Appellees, by answer, raised the defenses that: the claims in suit were invalid for want of invention and because they do not particularly point out and distinctly claim the invention; the claims in suit were not infringed by appellees; and appellants were barred or estopped from obtaining any relief because of their misuse of the Stearns patent by employing it to exercise a monopoly over unpatented materials. Appellees also filed a counterclaim against appellants predicated upon *51 the affirmative allegations of their answer and praying for (a) a declaratory judgment that the claims in suit were invalid and that appellees had not infringed said claims; (b) an injunction restraining appellants from acts of unfair competition and from asserting the Stearns patent against appellees and their customers; and (c) a judgment against appellants for damages…