Spring #ExceptionHandler not working - spring

Question

I am trying to handle an exception using #ExceptionHandler but it is not working and I don't know why. The thing is right now I am getting this response from my web service: {"message":"The date provided 2013-02-30 is invalid","code":500,"ids":null}. And I want that to be a 400 exception instead of 500.
Here is my code:
#Controller
public class WsController {
#RequestMapping(value={"/getDeletedUsers"}, method=RequestMethod.GET)
public List<Integer> getDeletedUsers(#RequestParam(value = "date", required = true) String dateStr) throws WebServiceException {
if (dateStr == null) {
throw new WebServiceException("The date provided is null");
} else if (StringUtils.isEmpty(dateStr)) {
throw new WebServiceException("The date provided is empty");
} else {
SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat();
sdf.applyPattern("yyyy-MM-dd");
sdf.setLenient(false);
try {
sdf.parse(dateStr);
} catch (ParseException e) {
throw new WebServiceException("The date provided " + dateStr + " is invalid");
}
return service.getDeletedUsers(dateStr);
}
}
#ExceptionHandler(WebServiceException.class)
public void handleWebServiceException() {
System.out.println("PLEASE DO SOMETHING!");
}
}
public class WebServiceException extends Exception {
//Constructors and serialVersionUID
}
disparcher-servlet.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<beans xmlns="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xmlns:context="http://www.springframework.org/schema/context"
xmlns:tx="http://www.springframework.org/schema/tx"
xmlns:util="http://www.springframework.org/schema/util"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans/spring-beans-3.0.xsd
http://www.springframework.org/schema/context http://www.springframework.org/schema/context/spring-context-3.0.xsd
http://www.springframework.org/schema/tx http://www.springframework.org/schema/tx/spring-tx-3.0.xsd
http://www.springframework.org/schema/util http://www.springframework.org/schema/util/spring-util.xsd">
<bean class="org.springframework.web.context.support.ServletContextPropertyPlaceholderConfigurer">
<property name="systemPropertiesModeName" value="SYSTEM_PROPERTIES_MODE_OVERRIDE"/>
<property name="searchContextAttributes" value="true"/>
<property name="contextOverride" value="true"/>
<property name="ignoreResourceNotFound" value="true"/>
<property name="locations">
<list>
<value>classpath:application.properties</value>
<value>file:c://rt//properties//webservices-application.properties</value>
</list>
</property>
</bean>
<import resource="classpath:keepalive.xml" />
<import resource="classpath:controller.xml" />
<bean id="exceptionResolver" class="com.company.project.webservices.spring.ExceptionResolver"/>
<bean id="error" class="com.company.project.webservices.spring.ErrorView"/>
<bean id="readOnlyModeError" class="com.company.project.webservices.spring.ReadOnlyModeErrorView"/>
<bean id="methodUnavailableError" class="com.company.project.webservices.spring.MethodUnavailableErrorView"/>
<bean id="badRequestError" class="com.company.project.webservices.spring.BadRequestErrorView"/>
<!-- View Resolver -->
<bean id="viewResolver" class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.ContentNegotiatingViewResolver">
<property name="order" value="1" />
<property name="mediaTypes">
<map>
<entry key="json" value="application/json"/>
</map>
</property>
<!-- Ticket-3245 Spring 60 -->
<property name="defaultContentType" value="application/json" />
<property name="useNotAcceptableStatusCode" value="true"/>
<property name="viewResolvers">
<list>
<bean class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.BeanNameViewResolver">
<property name="order" value="2" />
</bean>
</list>
</property>
<property name="defaultViews">
<list>
<bean class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.json.MappingJacksonJsonView" />
</list>
</property>
</bean>
<bean id="messageSource" class="org.springframework.context.support.ResourceBundleMessageSource">
<property name="basename" value="messages"/>
</bean>
<!-- Dispatches requests mapped to POJO #Controllers implementations -->
<bean class="org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.annotation.AnnotationMethodHandlerAdapter">
<property name="messageConverters">
<util:list id="beanList">
<ref bean="jsonHttpMessageConverter"/>
</util:list>
</property>
</bean>
<bean id="jsonHttpMessageConverter"
class="org.springframework.http.converter.json.MappingJacksonHttpMessageConverter">
</bean>
<bean class="org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.annotation.DefaultAnnotationHandlerMapping">
<property name="useDefaultSuffixPattern" value="false"/>
</bean>
<!-- Dispatches requests mapped to non-annotated controllers -->
<bean class="org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.SimpleControllerHandlerAdapter" />
<context:annotation-config/>
<context:component-scan base-package="com.company.project" />
When I try to debug the handleWebServiceException method it doesn't even stop there.
Any tips will be appreciated.

Answer 1

As jny suggested, I took a look at the dispatcher-servlet.xml and realized that there was a exceptionResolver bean that I haven't seen that looks like this:
public class ExceptionResolver extends AbstractHandlerExceptionResolver {
private static Log logger = LogFactory.getLog(ExceptionResolver.class);
#Override
protected ModelAndView doResolveException(HttpServletRequest request,
HttpServletResponse response, Object handler, Exception ex) {
ModelAndView mv = null;
if (ex instanceof ReadOnlyModeException) {
mv = new ModelAndView("readOnlyModeError");
} else if (ex instanceof MethodUnavailableException) {
mv = new ModelAndView("methodUnavailableError");
} else if (ex instanceof BadRequestException) {
mv = new ModelAndView("badRequestError");
} else {
logger.error("caught an exception: ", ex);
mv = new ModelAndView("error");
}
ResultBean resultBean = new ResultBean();
resultBean.setCode(500);
resultBean.setMessage(ex.getMessage());
mv.addObject("result", resultBean);
return mv;
}
}
And there I was able to make the suitable changes.
Thanks again to jny for the hint.