Court Opinion

ID: 9626078
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 08:01:30.913678+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:06:20.740758
License: Public Domain

Beasley, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent because the trial court’s judgment must be affirmed. This case was tried once before, and in the course of the trial now on appeal, the court made clear that it would base its decision on the evidence produced at the first trial as well as that produced in the second. The court stated: “I intend to use the records as I’ve tried this case once before. It’s not like a jury trial where they’ve never heard the evidence; I’ve heard this evidence once before. ... I do not intend to retry this entire case.”
We do not have before us the record in the first trial, and thus we cannot judge whether the evidence, taken all together, supported the court’s judgment of $52,754.33. It is appellant’s responsibility to assure that the record necessary for consideration of the enumerations of error is presented. Bennett v. Executive Benefits, 210 Ga. App. 429 (436 SE2d 544) (1993). In the absence of a full record, we must assume that the trial court ruled correctly, not the opposite. Id.; Wright v. State, 215 Ga. App. 569, 570 (2) (452 SE2d 118) (1994) (absent transcript of evidence, “ ‘this court must assume as a matter of law that the evidence at trial supported the court’s findings’ ” (citations omitted)). “Absent a showing to the contrary, the proceedings in the trial court are presumed to have been conducted in a regular and legal manner. [Cit.]” Cox v. City of Lawrenceville, 168 Ga. App. 119, 120 (1) (308 SE2d 224) (1983). Second, appellant did not seek find*424ings of fact from the trial court, as it could have done under OCGA § 9-11-52 (a). See Poor v. Leader Fed. Bank for Savings, 221 Ga. App. 889 (473 SE2d 563) (1996) (findings required only upon request of a party). Not having requested such prior to the court’s ruling, appellant had a second opportunity after the ruling to perfect the record in this regard, provided by subsection (c), but chose not to do so. These findings are necessary to show the basis upon which the award was calculated, as this figures into the enumerations of error raised. Their absence precludes a determination of the rightness or wrongness of the court’s judgment. Nat. Chemco v. Union Camp Corp., 209 Ga. App. 317, 318 (433 SE2d 691) (1993) (party’s failure to request findings precludes review of bench trial decision).
The findings of a trial court in a bench trial will not be disturbed on appeal if there is any evidence to support them. McMillan v. Motor Warehouse, 221 Ga. App. 550, 551 (472 SE2d 120) (1996). The problem here is that we do not have findings and we do not have all the evidence. We do know, however, that the court applied the measure of damages which this Court instructed it to use in Market Place Shopping Center v. Basic Business Alternatives, 213 Ga. App. 722, 723 (445 SE2d 824) (1994).1
A point should be made about appellant’s evidence. Its expert merely gave his opinion about the value of the leasehold with and without the non-competition agreement. That is not what was at issue. The tenant had already taken possession, made many improvements, started up a business, and a few months later faced the landlord’s breach of the lease which resulted in the demise of the tenant’s business. The tenant was not the willing holder of a lease without the non-competition provision, and the landlord could not blithely say, “let’s pretend you leased these premises without the provision, and I’ll pay the difference.” The tenant went to great trouble and expense in reliance on the promise that, for five years, no other deli would be leased space in the shopping center. Its damages were to be measured from the date of breach, and the leasehold’s condition and term then, not from the date the lease was made.
It is noted that the majority opinion states in the last sentence of the second paragraph of Division 2: “The speculative nature of lost profits is therefore not necessarily a bar to their indirect recovery.” That is not correct; whether lost profits may be figured into the *425difference in value of the lease broken and unbroken does not depend on whether they are speculative or not. If speculative, they may not be used to impact the value. There was some evidence that the anticipated profit figure given by the expert was not speculative and that the deli was then operating profitably. It was precisely the landlord’s early breach which prevented the tenant’s business from having a longer track record from which to project anticipated loss of profit.
Decided July 16, 1997.
Cohen, Pollock, Merlin, Axelrod & Tanenbaum, James J. Brissette, for appellant.
Sylvia K. Morrow, for appellee.

 The difference in the value of the leasehold broken and unbroken would, it seems to me, bring into play what a subtenant would be willing to pay a willing but unforced tenant for the leasehold, with and without the competition from Gorin’s, at the time of the breach. Gorin’s opened in March 1992, after the leasehold had been improved and outfitted to operate as a deli and bakery. At that point, what would a willing subtenant pay for the leasehold of approximately four and one-half years, in its then improved and operating condition, with and without the presence of Gorin’s?