There is also a possible precedence issue with your statement. If you meant:
$c = &func();
$c ? say "$c found!" : say "None!";
and not
$c = (&func() ? say "$c found!" : say "None!");
then you got it wrong.
?: has a higher precedence than assignment (see
perlop), so the ternary operator binds tighter to its operands than does the assignment operator. The ternary operator is handled first, then the assignment operator. To illustrate, try
perl -Mstrict -E 'sub func {5}; my $c; my $results = ( $c=func() ? 1 :
+ 2); say $c, "\t", $results'
and
perl -Mstrict -E 'sub func {5}; my $c; my $results = ( $c=func()) ? 1
+: 2; say $c, "\t", $results'
