A lawsuit filed by the whistleblower in the Cayuga County asbestos scandal has been dismissed - mostly because of missed deadlines on filing paperwork.

In a ruling released this week, a state Supreme Court judge dismissed 12 causes of action related to a complaint filed by former county worker Anthony Garropy, who had argued that his firing was an act of retaliation, that his civil rights were violated, and that he suffered emotional distress after reporting that asbestos had been illegally removed from a county office building.

Garropy had sought his job back and unspecified damages, contending that he was exposed to asbestos while removing a boiler in the county Board of Elections building between February and July 2006. Two related causes of action included in the same complaint by Garropy's wife, Bonnie, were also dismissed.

Garropy was the first person to come forward with details of the illegal asbestos removal project. Another county worker who oversaw the project, John Chick, is now serving time in a federal prison in Pennsylvania for his role in the crime. No one else was prosecuted.

Supreme Court judge David Barry, who took over the case after local judges Thomas Leone and Mark Fandrich recused themselves, ruled that Garropy's claim of being fired in violation of civil service law was invalid because Garropy had failed to file his complaint within one year. Garropy's asbestos-exposure allegations stem from July 2006, the court said, but Garropy did not file his lawsuit until October 2007.

Pertaining to six allegations that his firing violated federal whistleblower statutes designed to protect workers who report wrongdoing, the court said that Garropy had failed to file a complaint with the U.S. Secretary of Labor within the necessary 30-day window following the alleged violations.

The court further ruled that Garropy's claim of having had his federal civil rights violated failed to include a specific violation, and that there was no evidence to support his allegations regarding negligence and the intentional infliction of emotional distress by his employer.

Bonnie Garropy's related claims of asbestos exposure from coming into contact with her husband and other unspecified losses were also dismissed because they would have fallen under the same workers' compensation law that led to Anthony's claims being dismissed.