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Facebook will ask a federal court to dismiss Paul Ceglia’s Facebook ownership suit. Ceglia claims he has signed a contract with Mark Zuckerberg giving him as much as a 50% stake in Facebook.

Ceglia’s case is based on a contract dating from 2003, which he says Mark Zuckerberg signed. Facebook’s attorney Orin Snyder claims the contract is fake, since experts who’ve examined it found the ink is less than two years old. According to Snyder, Ceglia tried to artificially age the document .”The ink is wet.” said Snyder.

Ceglia’s attorney Dean Boland claims Facebook’s experts have used a non-scientific test to determine the age of the ink on the contract. Furthermore, he claims they’ve ruined the document during the examination. “This is the critical document in this case, and they damaged it,” said Boland.

Facebook will file a motion to dismiss the case in early 2012.

Ceglia’s lawsuit was originally filed in 2010 and refiled in April 2011, claiming Ceglia gave Zuckerberg $1,000 to fund a project called “the face book.”

According to the terms of the contract Zuckerberg allegedly signed, Ceglia was to receive a 50% stake of ownership in the project, in addition to 1% of the stake for each day the project was overdue — all in all, 84% of Facebook. In the end, Ceglia claims him and Zuckerberg settled for 50% of the company.

Facebook called the lawsuit “ridiculous.” Zuckerberg has confirmed he worked with Ceglia while in college, but it had nothing to do with what would later become Facebook.

[via BuffaloNews]

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Facebook has filed a legal motion against Paul Ceglia, the man who claims he owns 50% of Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook stake. The motion is filled with new evidence that implicates Ceglia as a fraud.

In its motion, Facebook requests for expedited discovery, where two parties exchange evidence for examination. Facebook wants to get its hands on the contract that Ceglia claims Zuckerberg signed.

The first section of the 27-page motion essentially lays out the facts of the case and claims that Ceglia has already changed his story. “During the remand proceedings, [Facebook] pointed out the incredible nature of Ceglia’s claims and declared that his lawsuit was a fraud based on a fabricated contract,” Facebook’s motion says. “In response, Ceglia did an about-face. He pulled back his original complaint, retained new lawyers, and filed a new complaint filled with new facts and new legal theories.”

Ceglia originally claimed he was entitled to 84% of Facebook when he filed his initial lawsuit in July 2010. Earlier this year, Ceglia refiled his lawsuit with the prominent law firm DLA Piper.

The rest of the motion is an all-out assault on Ceglia’s credibility and the documents he has provided. Facebook claims that Ceglia’s documents are forgeries. The company says Zuckerberg didn’t even come up with the idea for Facebook until December 2003 (Ceglia claims they signed a contract in April 2003).

Facebook then lays out evidence for why the contract “is an obvious cut-and-paste job,” noting inconsistencies in language, margins and terminology. Facebook even brought in linguistics expert Frank Romano, who concludes that the first two pages of the contract were written at different times. Facebook also tackles the email conversations Ceglia claims he had with Zuckerberg about Facebook, again claiming they were forgeries due to the language of the emails.

In the last section of the filing, Facebook attacks Ceglia’s credibility in no uncertain terms. “Ceglia is a professional con artist,” Facebook says. “A comprehensive background investigation conducted by the nationally renowned investigative firm Kroll Associates, Inc. established that Ceglia is a career criminal who has engaged in fraud, subterfuge and falsification of documents. From his 1997 felony conviction through his 2009 arrest for scamming New Yorkers, Ceglia has a long record of criminal and fraudulent behavior that spans decades.”

If Facebook’s allegations are correct, Ceglia could quickly find himself charged with fraud. In several private conversations we have had with Facebook, it’s been very clear that the company’s intention was to take Ceglia to the cleaners and hang him out to dry. Facebook believes that this lawsuit has gone on for long enough and won’t be giving Ceglia any mercy.

Facebook’s motion for expedited discovery is embedded below:

Court filing courtesy of Forbes

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Facebook has finally filed a formal legal response to Paul Ceglia, the convicted felon and woodchip salesman who claims Mark Zuckerberg promised him a stake in Facebook in return for a $1,000 investment during the site’s early days.

Ceglia’s lawsuit was filed last year and refiled in April, bolstered by emails allegedly confirming his story, although no one has been able to confirm the authenticity of those emails. It claims Ceglia gave Zuckerberg $1,000 to fund “the face book.”

Supposedly Ceglia was to receive 50% of the site in return, in addition to 1% of the company each day the project was delayed past a given deadline. By the end of their dealings, Ceglia says, Zuckerberg owed him 84% of the company, and the two settled for 50% of Zuckerberg’s stake — though he waited until the company was worth billions to take the claim to court.

“This is a fraudulent lawsuit brought by a convicted felon, and we look forward to defending it in court,” a Facebook spokesman told Mashable in April. “From the outset, we’ve said that this scam artist’s claims are ridiculous, and this newest complaint is no better.”

On Thursday, the company filed its official legal response in United States District Court in Buffalo, New York. Evidently, Zuckerberg’s lawyers have spent the past month upping the ante on their language. “This lawsuit is a brazen and outrageous fraud on the court,” says the company filing. “Plaintiff is an inveterate scam artist whose misconduct extends across decades and borders. His latest and most far-reaching fraud is the amended complaint filed in this action, which is based upon a doctored contract and fabricated evidence.

“Plaintiff alleges that he recently ‘discovered’ a purported contract that now supposedly entitles him to ownership of 50 percent of Zuckerberg’s interest in Facebook. The purported contract was signed in 2003, yet plaintiff waited until 2010 to file this action — a seven-year delay during which plaintiff remained utterly silent while Facebook grew into one of the world’s best-known companies. Plaintiff has now come out of the woodwork seeking billions in damages.”

Note the subtle dig at Ceglia’s current occupation, selling woodchip pellets for fuel? That’s why these guys get paid the big money. It’s also a sign that Facebook has learned its lesson from the long-running Winklevoss legal drama: Don’t give your opponents an inch, or they’ll take you for $65 million — and keep hammering away at you in the courts.

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