I didn't say anything that contradicts that. It's perfectly fine to use $! immediately after unlink returns an error as I showed in the very post you quoted.
In moritz's code, $! isn't being used immediately after unlink returns an error. In decreasing likeliness of occurrence,
In reply to Re^4: Unlinking a file when the file doesnt exist
by ikegami
in thread Unlinking a file when the file doesnt exist
by Anonymous Monk
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