For example if i just simply put in the following into the execute shell for Before Release build

exit 1

This return code will simply being ignored which mean in result that the real build step will be executed which is in my opinion wrong. I have checked that this is true for all kind of ... build steps in relationship with execute shell.

I have added the output of the console which shows this behaviour:

00:00:00.002 Started by user khmarbaise
00:00:00.003 [EnvInject] - Loading node environment variables.
00:00:00.004 Building on master in workspace /opt/build/jenkins/workspace/test-release
00:00:00.011 [test-release] $ /bin/sh -xe /tmp/hudson1223783551402627107.sh
00:00:00.030 + exit 1
00:00:00.032 ERROR: Failed to parse POMs

The exit 1 is from the pre release step and the ERROR: Failed to parse POMs is from the build step which should never being executed in case of the exit 1.