diff -r 568312ea04fa Lib/test/test_wsgiref.py
--- a/Lib/test/test_wsgiref.py	Sun Oct 14 04:17:50 2012 +0200
+++ b/Lib/test/test_wsgiref.py	Wed Oct 17 23:29:22 2012 -0700
@@ -602,6 +602,25 @@
             "\r\n".encode("iso-8859-1")+MSG))
         self.assertIn("AssertionError", h.stderr.getvalue())
 
+    def testCloseOnError(self):
+        side_effects = {'close_called': False}
+        MSG = b"Some output has been sent"
+        def error_app(e,s):
+            s("200 OK",[])(MSG)
+            class CrashyIterable(object):
+                def __iter__(self):
+                    while True:
+                        yield b'blah' 
+                        raise AssertionError("This should be caught by handler")
+
+                def close(self):
+                    side_effects['close_called'] = True
+            return CrashyIterable()
+
+        h = ErrorHandler()
+        h.run(error_app)
+        self.assertEqual(side_effects['close_called'], True)
+
 
     def testHeaderFormats(self):
 
diff -r 568312ea04fa Lib/wsgiref/handlers.py
--- a/Lib/wsgiref/handlers.py	Sun Oct 14 04:17:50 2012 +0200
+++ b/Lib/wsgiref/handlers.py	Wed Oct 17 23:29:22 2012 -0700
@@ -174,11 +174,13 @@
         in the event loop to iterate over the data, and to call
         'self.close()' once the response is finished.
         """
-        if not self.result_is_file() or not self.sendfile():
-            for data in self.result:
-                self.write(data)
-            self.finish_content()
-        self.close()
+        try:
+            if not self.result_is_file() or not self.sendfile():
+                for data in self.result:
+                    self.write(data)
+                self.finish_content()
+        finally:
+            self.close()
 
 
     def get_scheme(self):
diff -r 568312ea04fa Misc/ACKS
--- a/Misc/ACKS	Sun Oct 14 04:17:50 2012 +0200
+++ b/Misc/ACKS	Wed Oct 17 23:29:22 2012 -0700
@@ -1177,6 +1177,7 @@
 Matthias Troffaes
 John Tromp
 Jason Trowbridge
+Brent Tubbs
 Anthony Tuininga
 Erno Tukia
 David Turner