Well, what else would you return? A `400 Bad Request` error might be more appropriate, but a `500 Internal Server Error` is "A generic error message, given when

Well, what else would you return? A `400 Bad Request` error might be more appropriate, but a `500 Internal Server Error` is "A generic error message, given when an unexpected condition was encountered and no more specific message is suitable." - you don't want to leak internal state, obviously, so just log the problem and respond with a 500. TL;DR: Might be a segfault, but it's 2015 - it probably isn't.