Opinion
No. 08-13457 Non-Argument Calendar.
March 13, 2009.
Roberto Mario Vargas, Jones Foster Johnston Stubbs, P.A., West Palm Beach, FL, for Plaintiff-Counter-Defendant-Appellant.
Alexander J. Repasky, Marietta, GA, Marshall Dore Louis, Sinclair, Louis, Heath, Nussbaum, Miami, FL, for Defendant-Counter-Claimant-Third Party Plaintiff-Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida. D.C. Docket No. 06-80928-CV-DTKH.
Before CARNES, MARCUS and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.
This case involves two contracts between Florida Airmotive, Inc. and Deryl Perry for the manufacture and sale of fourteen mobile airplane hangars. Due to a series of missteps, delays, and misunderstandings, the contracts were never completed. Florida Airmotive, having paid Perry $225,000 and having no hangars to show for it, sued. It lost. After a bench trial, the district court concluded that Perry substantially performed under the contracts by tendering to Florida Airmotive compliant drawings and specifications for the hangars, completing (although not delivering) four of the fourteen hangars, and remaining ready, willing, and able to complete and deliver the remaining ten hangars after the building permits were granted.
We review factual findings made by a district court after a bench trial for clear error and review de novo its conclusions of law. See Belize Telecom, Ltd. v. Government of Belize, 528 F.3d 1298, 1303 (11th Cir. 2008). A district court's finding of fact is clearly erroneous if we are "left with the definite and firm conviction that a mistake has been committed." Holton v. City of Thomasville Sch. Dist., 425 F.3d 1325, 1350 (11th Cir. 2005). By contrast, the district court, does not commit clear error if its "account of the evidence is plausible in light of the record viewed in its entirety." Id. at 1351.
Florida Airmotive contends that the district court clearly erred in finding that Perry submitted code-compliant drawings and specifications. It argues that there is no evidence in the record that the documents provided by Perry were compliant with the Florida Business Code. We disagree. The documents and drawings are in the record. They were stamped and signed by an engineering firm licensed in Florida, in a manner that the district court reasonable could interpret as certifying them as compliant with the 2001 Florida Building Code. Based on that evidence, we are not left "left with the definite and firm conviction that a mistake has been committed." Id. Therefore, the district court did not err in holding that Perry substantially complied with the requirements of the contract.