The fugitive accused of trying to scam Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg out of half his fortune sliced off his GPS ankle monitor and affixed it to a crudely built contraption in his rural New York residence "in order to give the appearance that he was still present and moving within his home."

That's what prosecutors said in court papers as the hunt widened for Paul Ceglia, his family, and dog.

US Marshals went to check on Ceglia in Wellsville and discovered his ankle monitor Sunday but not the 41-year-old defendant whose federal fraud criminal trial was scheduled for May 4. His wife, Iasia, and his two sons, 10 and 11 years old, have also vanished, as has the family's Jack Russell terrier.

Prosecutors said in a court filing (PDF) that Ceglia was attempting to dupe the authorities as he made his getaway from his home in Wellsville, about 70 miles southeast of Buffalo.

As part of Ceglia's $250,000 bail conditions, he was required to wear a GPS electronic monitoring device around his ankle.

"At some point this past weekend, Ceglia—whose pretrial release conditions included electronic monitoring as a condition of his release—jumped bail. Before doing so, Ceglia removed his GPS bracelet and attached it to a motorized contraption of his own creation in order to give the appearance that he was still present and moving within his home," the authorities said in the filing.

The filing said the authorities got suspicious that something was awry with the GPS device on March 6. An agent spoke with Ceglia on the phone and "Ceglia reported that the bracelet had been damaged in a fall." But the agent said it subsequently was "functioning properly" until the next day.

The Officer was alerted again on or about the evening of March 7, 2015 that there was no motion on the bracelet, but that the bracelet was in the immediate vicinity of Ceglia’s home. The bracelet continued to indicate no motion until approximately 8 a.m. on March 8, 2015, when it indicated it was charging for approximately 30 minutes. Through the evening on or about March 7, 2015 and continuing until the morning on or about March 8, 2015, the Officer repeatedly attempted to contact Ceglia by telephone and through the bracelet itself, but received no response. Local police visited Ceglia's home on or about March 8, 2015 and received no response when they knocked at the door.

A US Marshals Service Fugitive Task Force arrived and used "forced entry" to get inside, according to the filing.

Because the Task Force Officers had been informed that Ceglia’s GPS bracelet was indicating that he was at his home, and because they could hear a mechanical noise coming from inside the home, the Task Force Officers forced entry into the home, both to check on the welfare on anyone inside, and to execute the arrest warrant. While conducting a security sweep of the home, the Task Force Officers observed, among other things, a hand-made contraption connected to the ceiling, from which Ceglia’s GPS bracelet was hanging. The purpose of the contraption appeared to be to keep the bracelet in motion using a stick connected to a motor that would rotate or swing the bracelet.

Ceglia claimed that Mark Zuckerberg promised him half of Facebook when Zuckerberg was an 18-year-old Harvard University student—and he sued Zuckerberg and Facebook. Ceglia is charged criminally with accusations that his lawsuit was a fraud. He has pleaded not guilty. The charges carry a maximum 40-year prison term.