Former Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice and erstwhile U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore was too late in filing an appeal of his dismissed libel lawsuit against the Washington Examiner, a federal appeals court panel ruled Wednesday.

Moore sued the Examiner, three of its writers, its editors and owners for $40 million in 2020, claiming the outlet defamed him when Examiner columnist Tiana Lowe Doescher wrote in 2019: “”Roy Moore, famous for being banned from a mall because he sexually preyed on underage girls and losing a Senate race in an R+14 state, apparently wants another round at the rodeo.”

The article, Moore claimed, also called him an “accused sexual assailant and pedophile” as well as “a comic book villain” and a “skunk.”

The lawsuit had already been dismissed twice before Moore filed his latest appeal in May.

But a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, which oversees appeals of federal cases in Alabama, determined Moore was too late in filing his appeal.

Moore had 30 days from the April 3 final judgment dismissing the case to file the appeal, meaning he had to file it by May 3, according to the ruling.

But Moore filed his notice of appeal on June 12, making the filing “untimely,” the panel decided.

The lawsuit was one of several Moore filed in the wake of his shocking defeat to Democrat Doug Jones in deep-red Alabama in the 2017 special election to replace former Sen. Jeff Sessions.

During the campaign, Moore was dogged by allegations of sexual misconduct involving girls as young as 16 years old decades before.

Moore denied the allegations and claimed they were malicious and timed to undermine his candidacy, coming in the final weeks of the campaign for the December 2017 special election.

In a related case, last week the Alabama Supreme Court affirmed a lower court ruling in another defamation case lodged by Moore.

The state Supreme Court upheld rulings from the Etowah County Circuit Court dismissing Moore’s defamation claims against Deborah Wesson Gibson and Richard Hagedorn. The lawsuit accused Gibson and Hagedorn of promoting a conspiracy to spread false rumors.

The Supreme Court also upheld the lower court’s rulings dismissing counterclaims by Hagedorn against Moore, Moore’s Senate campaign, Janet Porter, a spokeswoman for the campaign, and Herring Networks Inc.