Cher has won her four-year legal battle with Mary Bono over royalties from her music catalog with the late Sonny Bono, but she will not recover the roughly $1 million she spent on legal fees.
U.S. District Judge John A. Kronstadt denied Cher’s request to have Mary, who is now head of Sonny’s estate, reimburse her $1,023,605.50 in attorney fees. He ruled the dispute centered primarily on contract law rather than federal copyright law, meaning the statutory provisions allowing fee-shifting did not apply.
The core of the dispute
The case stems from Cher and Sonny’s 1978 divorce settlement, which granted Cher a 50 percent share of publishing royalties from songs they wrote together as Sonny & Cher, including “I Got You Babe,” “The Beat Goes On” and “Baby Don’t Go.” The arrangement remained in effect after Sonny died in a skiing accident in 1998 and Mary assumed control of his estate.
In 2021, Mary argued Cher was no longer entitled to those music royalties, citing the Copyright Act’s termination right, which allows songwriters and their heirs to reclaim control of intellectual property decades after signing it away.
Sonny’s publishing grants became eligible for termination beginning in 2018, prompting Mary to notify publishers of her intent to reclaim certain interests.
The judge rejected that argument in a 2024 ruling, finding that California contract law governing the 1978 divorce settlement took precedence because the agreement was a contract for financial compensation rather than a copyright assignment. He entered final judgment in Cher’s favor on November 26, 2025.
What the Judge ruled
John also ruled that Cher retains the right to receive her composition and record royalties directly, even after selling those rights to Irving Azoff‘s Iconic Artists Group in 2022.
Mary had sought to deal directly with Iconic and route royalty payments through Sonny’s estate without Cher’s involvement, an approach the judge rejected.
Following the ruling, Cher’s legal team asked the court to order Mary to pay her attorney fees, arguing she had “dragged this case out for five years by taking patently unreasonable positions” and had attempted to “misuse” the Copyright Act’s termination provisions to “obtain a windfall” at Cher’s expense.
In the January filing, Cher’s lawyers wrote, “Given the relief that Cher sought and the amounts of royalties involved, Cher was perfectly justified in incurring $1,023,605.50 in attorney’s fees to successfully defeat defendant’s improper attempt at termination.”
The filing also stated, “Defendant argued, repeatedly and frivolously, that a federal statute that expressly states it does not affect state-law rights somehow extinguishes those state law rights.”
Cher’s attorneys at Davis Wright Tremaine — Peter Anderson, Sean Sullivan, Eric Lamm and Samuel Turner — billed nearly 2,000 hours at rates ranging from $400 to $795 per hour.
Responding to the earlier 2024 ruling, Mary’s attorney, Daniel Schacht, said, “We appreciate Judge Kronstadt’s efforts in the case but believe he got the law wrong on copyright terminations.” Her legal team also asked the court to deny attorney-fee requests from either side.
Why Cher was denied reimbursement
Despite Cher’s arguments, John sided with Mary on the fee issue. He concluded that because the case was decided primarily under contract law rather than federal copyright law, the Copyright Act’s fee-shifting provisions did not apply.
The judge had previously denied a similar attorney-fee request in the unrelated “Blurred Lines” copyright case involving Marvin Gaye‘s estate, a precedent that shaped expectations ahead of his ruling.
The $1,023,605.50 Cher spent on legal fees also exceeded the monetary value of the judgment she ultimately received.
Appeal still pending
The dispute is not over. Mary has appealed John’s ruling that Cher is entitled to half the publishing royalties from the Sonny & Cher catalog. A federal appeals court has not yet ruled, leaving that portion of the case unresolved.
A lawyer for Mary said they “do not have any comment at this time.” A lawyer for Cher did not immediately respond to Rolling Stone‘s request for comment.
