diff --git a/docs/error-handling.md b/docs/error-handling.md
index 2dbe64a715a..719244d2fd7 100644
--- a/docs/error-handling.md
+++ b/docs/error-handling.md
@@ -128,7 +128,7 @@ The public error API
   bugs, but in the meantime, please code defensively and check for NULL
   when calling this function.
 
-- `void geterr_clear(void)`: This function clears the last error.  The
+- `void giterr_clear(void)`: This function clears the last error.  The
   library will call this when an error is generated by low level function
   and the higher level function handles the error.
 
diff --git a/src/refdb_fs.c b/src/refdb_fs.c
index 921f7862bfc..9f87b30d491 100644
--- a/src/refdb_fs.c
+++ b/src/refdb_fs.c
@@ -1463,7 +1463,7 @@ static int reflog_parse(git_reflog *log, const char *buf, size_t buf_size)
 		entry = git__calloc(1, sizeof(git_reflog_entry));
 		GITERR_CHECK_ALLOC(entry);
 
-		entry->committer = git__malloc(sizeof(git_signature));
+		entry->committer = git__calloc(1, sizeof(git_signature));
 		GITERR_CHECK_ALLOC(entry->committer);
 
 		if (git_oid_fromstrn(&entry->oid_old, buf, GIT_OID_HEXSZ) < 0)
diff --git a/tests/refs/reflog/reflog.c b/tests/refs/reflog/reflog.c
index 56ec422c39c..d2b8e0fa35a 100644
--- a/tests/refs/reflog/reflog.c
+++ b/tests/refs/reflog/reflog.c
@@ -154,6 +154,22 @@ void test_refs_reflog_reflog__reading_the_reflog_from_a_reference_with_no_log_re
 	git_buf_free(&subtrees_log_path);
 }
 
+void test_refs_reflog_reflog__reading_a_reflog_with_invalid_format_returns_error(void)
+{
+	git_reflog *reflog;
+	const git_error *error;
+
+	/* clear the error state so we can capture the error generated by git_reflog_read */
+	giterr_clear();
+
+	cl_git_fail(git_reflog_read(&reflog, g_repo, "refs/heads/extra-newline"));
+
+	error = giterr_last();
+
+	cl_assert(error != NULL);
+	cl_assert_equal_s("Unable to parse OID - contains invalid characters", error->message);
+}
+
 void test_refs_reflog_reflog__cannot_write_a_moved_reflog(void)
 {
 	git_reference *master, *new_master;
diff --git a/tests/resources/testrepo.git/logs/refs/heads/extra-newline b/tests/resources/testrepo.git/logs/refs/heads/extra-newline
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000..c809e013769
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/resources/testrepo.git/logs/refs/heads/extra-newline
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+0000000000000000000000000000000000000000 be3563ae3f795b2b4353bcce3a527ad0a4f7f644 Ben Straub <bstraub@github.com> 1335806563 -0800	clone: from
+/Users/ben/src/libgit2/tests/resources/testrepo.git
+be3563ae3f795b2b4353bcce3a527ad0a4f7f644 a65fedf39aefe402d3bb6e24df4d4f5fe4547750 Ben Straub <bstraub@github.com> 1335806603 -0800	commit: checking in