diff --git a/Changes b/Changes
index 5724b9c..cc5c464 100644
--- a/Changes
+++ b/Changes
@@ -1,10 +1,12 @@
-0.59.7 2021-12-01
+0.60 2021-12-03
     - [feature] Implemented a new cache with on disk
       storage and auto-update (margaretha).
     - [feature] Support for tokenized snippet output
       (fixed #72; diewald)
+    - [cleanup] Added error messages to unsupported queries in 
+      SpanAttributeQuery (margaretha) 
 
-0.59.6 
+0.59.6 2021-11-10
     - [bugfix] Fixed skipping of focus spans (fixed #78; margaretha,
       diewald)
     - [bugfix] Clear matchlist if skip fails in NextSpans
diff --git a/src/main/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/wrap/SpanAttributeQueryWrapper.java b/src/main/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/wrap/SpanAttributeQueryWrapper.java
index 0e22fd7..616fad5 100644
--- a/src/main/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/wrap/SpanAttributeQueryWrapper.java
+++ b/src/main/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/wrap/SpanAttributeQueryWrapper.java
@@ -51,8 +51,8 @@
             return new SpanAttributeQuery((SpanTermQuery) sq, isNegative, true);
         }
         else {
-            throw new IllegalArgumentException(
-                    "The subquery is not a SpanTermQuery.");
+            throw new QueryException(
+                    "SpanAttributeQuery only supports SpanTermQuery.");
         }
     }
 }
diff --git a/src/main/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/wrap/SpanWithAttributeQueryWrapper.java b/src/main/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/wrap/SpanWithAttributeQueryWrapper.java
index efb476d..70e816a 100644
--- a/src/main/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/wrap/SpanWithAttributeQueryWrapper.java
+++ b/src/main/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/wrap/SpanWithAttributeQueryWrapper.java
@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@
 import de.ids_mannheim.korap.query.SpanAttributeQuery;
 import de.ids_mannheim.korap.query.SpanWithAttributeQuery;
 import de.ids_mannheim.korap.util.QueryException;
+import de.ids_mannheim.korap.util.StatusCodes;
 
 /**
  * No optimization using expansion
@@ -182,8 +183,8 @@
                         attrQueryWrapper.isNegative, true);
             }
             else {
-                throw new IllegalArgumentException(
-                        "The subquery is not a SpanTermQuery.");
+                throw new QueryException(StatusCodes.UNSUPPORTED_QUERY,
+                        "SpanAttributeQuery only supports SpanTermQuery.");
             }
         }
         return null;
diff --git a/src/test/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/TestSpanWithAttributeJSON.java b/src/test/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/TestSpanWithAttributeJSON.java
index 481949d..89e110b 100644
--- a/src/test/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/TestSpanWithAttributeJSON.java
+++ b/src/test/java/de/ids_mannheim/korap/query/TestSpanWithAttributeJSON.java
@@ -1,20 +1,32 @@
 package de.ids_mannheim.korap.query;
 
-import static de.ids_mannheim.korap.TestSimple.*;
+import static de.ids_mannheim.korap.TestSimple.getJsonQuery;
 import static org.junit.Assert.assertEquals;
+import static org.junit.Assert.assertThrows;
 
 import org.apache.lucene.search.spans.SpanQuery;
-import org.junit.Rule;
 import org.junit.Test;
-import org.junit.rules.ExpectedException;
 
 import de.ids_mannheim.korap.query.wrap.SpanQueryWrapper;
 import de.ids_mannheim.korap.util.QueryException;
+import de.ids_mannheim.korap.util.StatusCodes;
 
 public class TestSpanWithAttributeJSON {
-    @Rule
-    public ExpectedException exception = ExpectedException.none();
+    @Test
+    public void testElementRegexAttribute () throws QueryException {
+        String filepath = getClass()
+                .getResource(
+                        "/queries/attribute/element-regex-attribute.jsonld")
+                .getFile();
+        SpanQueryWrapper sqwi = getJsonQuery(filepath);
 
+        QueryException exception = assertThrows(QueryException.class, () -> {
+            sqwi.toQuery();
+        });
+        assertEquals("SpanAttributeQuery only supports SpanTermQuery.",
+                exception.getMessage());
+        assertEquals(StatusCodes.UNSUPPORTED_QUERY, exception.getErrorCode());
+    }
 
     @Test
     public void testElementSingleAttribute () throws QueryException {
@@ -179,13 +191,16 @@
     @Test
     public void testAnyElementSingleNotAttribute () throws QueryException {
 
-        exception.expectMessage("The query requires a positive attribute.");
         String filepath = getClass()
                 .getResource(
                         "/queries/attribute/any-element-with-single-not-attribute.jsonld")
                 .getFile();
-        SpanQueryWrapper sqwi = getJsonQuery(filepath);
-        SpanQuery sq = sqwi.toQuery();
+        
+        Exception exception = assertThrows(QueryException.class, () -> {
+            getJsonQuery(filepath);
+        });
+        assertEquals("The query requires a positive attribute.",
+                exception.getMessage());
         //        assertEquals("tokens:???", sq.toString());
     }
 }
diff --git a/src/test/resources/queries/attribute/element-regex-attribute.jsonld b/src/test/resources/queries/attribute/element-regex-attribute.jsonld
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4598947
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/test/resources/queries/attribute/element-regex-attribute.jsonld
@@ -0,0 +1,19 @@
+{
+    "@context": "http://ids-mannheim.de/ns/KorAP/json-ld/v0.2/context.jsonld",
+    "errors": [],
+    "warnings": [],
+    "messages": [],
+    "collection": {},
+    "query": {
+        "@type": "koral:span",
+        "key": "head",
+        "attr": {
+            "@type": "koral:term",
+            "type"	: "type:regex",
+            "layer": "type",
+            "key": "top.*",
+            "match": "match:eq"
+        }
+    },
+    "meta": {}
+}