BOSTON (Map, News) - When Dr. Mark Flomenbaum was picked to be the state's chief medical examiner, he was given the task of turning around an agency plagued by chronic underfunding and staff mistakes that included losing a set of eyeballs and misidentifying a fire victim's body.

But soon, there was a new set of blunders under Flomenbaum's watch, including a lost body that was later found buried in the wrong grave.

Less than three years after he took the job, Flomenbaum was fired by Gov. Deval Patrick, who cited the body mixup as well as a case backlog that caused staffers in the medical examiner's office to stack corpses at the Boston headquarters and in a refrigerated truck parked near the office.

On Wednesday, the state's highest court will consider whether Patrick had grounds to fire Flomenbaum. The court also is being asked to decide whether an agreement between Patrick's predecessor and Flomenbaum is a contract that is legally binding on Patrick.

Flomenbaum was a medical examiner in New York City when he was recruited by the administration of former Gov. Mitt Romney in 2005. In court papers, Flomenbaum said he agreed to uproot his family and move to Massachusetts only after the Romney administration pledged to significantly increase funding to the office.

He said he was making progress on fixing long-standing problems in the office, including reducing a body backlog and improving professional standards, when Patrick fired him after the highly publicized misplacement of the body of a Cape Cod man in May 2007. The body of Thomas Brissette was mistakenly released to a funeral home and buried under the name of another person.

In his letter dismissing Flomenbaum, Patrick said "no question has been raised regarding your excellent reputation as a pathologist." But Patrick went on to fault Flomenbaum for "serious problems concerning the performance of your administrative and managerial duties," particularly his "unacceptable handling of the missing body situation."

Flomenbaum argues in court documents that the body mixup was not caused by him, but instead by a mortuary technician who did not follow standard operating procedures for the release of bodies to funeral homes. And he says the other problems cited by Patrick, including the body backlog and a failure to meet public health and occupational safety standards, were "directly attributable to historic inadequacies" of the office.

"If he did not produce miracles, Dr. Flomenbaum was nevertheless a highly effective performer in attacking the chronic deficiencies and achieving the objective set forth for him," Flomenbaum's lawyers argue in a recent court filing.

Flomenbaum declined comment and referred calls to one of his attorneys, Thomas R. Kiley, who also declined comment Tuesday.

Patrick's spokesman, Kyle Sullivan, said the governor stands by his decision to fire Flomenbaum.

"The administration removed Dr. Flomenbaum for his failure to exercise effective management of the office, which included his unacceptable handling of the case involving a missing body," Sullivan said in a written statement.

In court documents, Attorney General Martha Coakley, whose office is representing the governor, said Patrick had ample cause to fire Flomenbaum.

Romney appointed Flomenbaum in January 2005 to restore the integrity and reputation of the medical examiner's office.

A little more than two years later, however, Patrick concluded events that happened under Flomenbaum's leadership had "further damaged, rather than restored, the reputation of the office, and thereby had severely harmed the public interest," Assistant Attorneys General Thomas Barnico and James Sweeney argued in a court filing last month.

The Patrick administration accuses Flomenbaum of using the historic problems of the medical examiner's office as a "refuge" and "almost an immunity" for his own mistakes.

Emily LaGrassa, a spokeswoman for Coakley, declined comment.