Greg Mortenson, author of best-selling book "Three Cups of Tea," asked a judge to throw out the civil lawsuit that claims he fabricated part of his book on terms that if allowed it would subject other authors to similar claims and hinder free exchange of ideas.
"Plaintiffs should not be allowed to create a world where authors are exposed to the debilitating expense of class action litigation just because someone believes a book contains inaccuracies," attorney John Kauffman wrote in the filing late last month.
A hearing has not been scheduled yet whether to dismiss the case against Mortenson.
Last year, a lawsuit accuses Mortenson of being involved in a racketeering scheme to make him into a false and defraud millions of people and money raised to the Bozeman-based charity Central Asia Institute. Other defendents in the suit are co-author David Relin, publisher Penguin Group, and the Central Asia Institute.
The lawsuit surfaced a few weeks after author Jon Krakauer and "60 Minutes" revealed in April 2011 discrepancies in the "Three Cups of Tea" and questioned whether Mortenson was benefiting from his charity.
The lawsuit claims Mortenson lied about how he began building schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan and fabricated other events in the books "Three Cups of Tea" and "Stones Into Schools." The attorney who led the Frey lawsuit, Larry Drury, is also a plaintiffs' attorney in the nine-month-old case against Mortenson.
The plaintiff's attorney have drawn comparisons of Mortenson's case to that of James Frey's "A Million Little Pieces" being revealed of fraud. They said the two cases are "nearly identical" and that the lawsuit should go forward because of the precedent class-action suit.
"The facts in the (Frey) case are stunningly close to the facts in this case, but not nearly as compelling," wrote attorney Alexander Blewett.
A judge in 2007 certified a class-action lawsuit by readers against Frey, and the settlement offered a refund to anybody who bought the book before the falsehoods were acknowledged. Only 1,729 people asked to be reimbursed, costing Random House $27,348.
Mortenson has rejected claims of wrongdoing when the case was revealed. At the year-end letter, the Central Asia Institute wrote that Mortenson would no longer be involved in the charity's day-to-day operations.