DMCA takedown notice

I have emailed WLD numerous time and all the responses have been "they don't have a legal right to force/request my website to be taken offline"

long story short:

former webdesigner for my website who created the entire website from scratch and created everything, he was doing it for free but i kept him out of the loop on some bad publicity we were having on some forums and when i told him about it, he decided to take it into his own hands and issue statements without my consent and he started attacking me and the company and has requested numerous time in written text to remove the site because "you hadn't paid me for the designing" which is a lie as it was suppost to be free and 2 days ago he issued a dmca notice and i took it down for a bit until i was reading about dmca takedown notices and the fact that wld lawyers said he doesnt have a right to so i am waiting until he dmca the web host "HostGator" i myself provide webhosting but he is to contact HostGator first and that his dmca was set out correctly but his "Company" is not real or registered in the state of Arizona. I am asking others here on what they think? but he created the whole website for me and even have paypal proof that he was infact paying me for webhosting while he was creating the website for me, he paid me for two months and than started offering him free hosting because he was creating a website for me. He copyrighted everything to my business, all images/pages etc.. he even has written on everypage that the package was for my business. what do you people think here?

[Law200]

If he gave it to you or you somehow paid, he cannot take it back under any circumstances unless an agreement specifically says so.

Yes he made it for me and gave it to me, but their was no legal agreement made or any contract written or verbal. he sent me dmca and says after 48 hours he will contact his legal team and says i will have to pay court fees etc... though i am waiting for wld to email the guy and respond back to me, that was what susan said if i recall, also wld always says that he has no legal right but why does he send a dmca and says his legal team says otherwise...? if wld says he has no right doesn't that "my former webdesigner" is abusing and illegally using the dmca? the site in question is servertell.net/index.php main page is hidden for now..