I have a method dedicated to finding an NSManagedObject ('company') using a supplied NSString and, if it's not found, creating a new one and returning it. As far as I know it's fully inited and the method works perfectly. That is, until the line after the return statement, when the app crashes with an objc_exception_throw. I googled this and couldn't find what causes it, only how to use it in breakpoint debugging.

What's wrong with this method, and why is it throwing specifically this exception?

- (NSManagedObject*) getCompanyObject:(NSString*)theCompany
{
    NSError *error = nil;
    NSManagedObjectContext *moc = [[self delegate] managedObjectContext];

    NSFetchRequest *fetch = [[[NSFetchRequest alloc] init] autorelease];
    NSEntityDescription *entityDescription = [NSEntityDescription entityForName:@"Company" inManagedObjectContext:moc];
    [fetch setEntity:entityDescription];

    // object to be returned
    NSManagedObject *companyObject = [[NSManagedObject alloc] initWithEntity:entityDescription insertIntoManagedObjectContext:moc];

    // set predicate (company name)
    NSPredicate *pred = [NSPredicate predicateWithFormat:[NSString stringWithFormat:@"name = \"%@\"", theCompany]];
    [fetch setPredicate:pred];

    NSArray *response = [moc executeFetchRequest:fetch error:&error];

    if ([response count] == 0) // empty resultset --> no companies with this name
    {
    [companyObject setValue:theCompany forKey:@"name"];
    NSLog(@"%@ not found. Adding.", theCompany);
    }
    else
    [companyObject setValue:[[response objectAtIndex:0] valueForKey:@"name"]];

    return companyObject;
}