Legal Question in Civil Litigation in California

Generally when a fee agreement provides for the fee to be different depending on whether there is a trial or not, the trial is considered to have started if you show up on the day of trial and the case is called. In most cases 85-95% of the work of a trial is done at that point. My contingency fee agreements provide that if a case settles less than two weeks before trial, the case is deemed to have gone to trial. I only modify that in cases where there will be a very long trial. So I think your lawyer is being very fair offering to refund half the $3,000 balance.

Mr. McCormick is probably right, but I would need to know exactly what your contract says and exactly what happened on the day of trial before I could offer an opinion.

You have a statutory right to arbitrate a fee dispute with your attorney. He or she is obligated to provide you with that information. If not, you can contact the California state bar or your local county bar association for arbitration information

You have a statutory right to arbitrate fee disputes such as yours. If you are interested in doing so, you should contact a local county or city bar association or the California State Bar. As one who often sits as a fee arbitrator, I would have many questions for both you and your lawyer as to what happened. One is exactly when did the case get dismissed. If you showed up for the trial on the date and time set and the prosecutor then told the judge they were dismissing your lawyer has an argument that the matter did not resolve "before" trial. In that case, offering to give you back even $1500 is more than fair. On the other hand, if the prosecutor dismissed the day before you might be entitled to your entire $3000 even though your attorney had spent lots of time preparing for trial. As you can see, it all depends on the specific facts. I hope this helps.

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