diff --git a/pom.xml b/pom.xml
index 2ea1892..5dc8bb9 100644
--- a/pom.xml
+++ b/pom.xml
@@ -127,7 +127,7 @@
     <dependency>
       <groupId>org.codehaus.plexus</groupId>
       <artifactId>plexus-utils</artifactId>
-      <version>3.0.20</version>
+      <version>3.0.23</version>
     </dependency>
     <dependency>
       <groupId>junit</groupId>
diff --git a/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/plugin/docck/AbstractCheckDocumentationMojo.java b/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/plugin/docck/AbstractCheckDocumentationMojo.java
index 18c505c..f6659b5 100644
--- a/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/plugin/docck/AbstractCheckDocumentationMojo.java
+++ b/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/plugin/docck/AbstractCheckDocumentationMojo.java
@@ -285,7 +285,8 @@
             {
                 writer = new FileWriter( output );
                 writer.write( messages );
-                writer.flush();
+                writer.close();
+                writer = null;
             }
             finally
             {
diff --git a/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/plugin/docck/CheckPluginDocumentationMojo.java b/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/plugin/docck/CheckPluginDocumentationMojo.java
index b9b5541..1a24734 100644
--- a/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/plugin/docck/CheckPluginDocumentationMojo.java
+++ b/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/plugin/docck/CheckPluginDocumentationMojo.java
@@ -150,6 +150,9 @@
 
                 String siteHtml = IOUtil.toString( streamReader );
 
+                streamReader.close();
+                streamReader = null;
+
                 if ( !siteHtml.contains( "href=\"index.html\"" ) )
                 {
                     reporter.error( "site.xml is missing the link to: index.html \"Introduction\"." );