Table of Cases to check current status of decisions. The court disagreed with a recent decision by the First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco. That court had decided that there was no right to attorney fees in such circumstances, in light of the Supreme Court's ruling in International Indus. After the landlord voluntarily dismissed an unlawful detainer action, the trial court awarded the tenant his attorney fees. The court of appeal affirmed.
Contracting parties are generally free to agree on how to allocate the costs of litigation.
Under Civil Code section 1717, the party who prevails on a contract may recover attorney fees, even if the contractual clause is one-sided. However, by its express terms, the statute does not apply to voluntary dismissals. In Olen , the Supreme Court had interpreted an earlier version of section 1717 that did not contain the current express limitation on its reach. The Jue decision took the Supreme Court at its word, and decided that there was no contractual right to attorney's fees after a voluntary dismissal. This court pointed out that the Supreme Court's statement about the limit on a contractual right was not necessary to the decision.