Pony.fm/app/Http/Middleware/JsonExceptions.php

<?php

/**
 * Pony.fm - A community for pony fan music.
 * Copyright (C) 2015 Feld0
 *
 * This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
 * it under the terms of the GNU Affero General Public License as published by
 * the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
 * (at your option) any later version.
 *
 * This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
 * but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
 * MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
 * GNU Affero General Public License for more details.
 *
 * You should have received a copy of the GNU Affero General Public License
 * along with this program.  If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
 */

namespace App\Http\Middleware;

use Closure;
use Symfony\Component\HttpKernel\Exception\HttpException;

/**
 * Class JsonExceptions
 * @package App\Http\Middleware
 *
 * This middleware turns any HTTP exceptions thrown during the request
 * into a JSON response. To be used when implementing the API!
 */
class JsonExceptions
{
    /**
     * Handle an incoming request.
     *
     * @param  \Illuminate\Http\Request  $request
     * @param  \Closure  $next
     * @return mixed
     */
    public function handle($request, Closure $next)
    {
        try {
            $response = $next($request);
        } catch (HttpException $e) {
            return \Response::json([
                'message' => $e->getMessage()
            ], $e->getStatusCode());
        }

        return $response;
    }
}