diff --git a/pmd-core/src/main/java/net/sourceforge/pmd/ant/internal/PMDTaskImpl.java b/pmd-core/src/main/java/net/sourceforge/pmd/ant/internal/PMDTaskImpl.java
index e7319b1859..bcd6c2e252 100644
--- a/pmd-core/src/main/java/net/sourceforge/pmd/ant/internal/PMDTaskImpl.java
+++ b/pmd-core/src/main/java/net/sourceforge/pmd/ant/internal/PMDTaskImpl.java
@@ -3,6 +3,7 @@
  */
 package net.sourceforge.pmd.ant.internal;
 
+import java.io.Closeable;
 import java.io.File;
 import java.io.IOException;
 import java.io.PrintWriter;
@@ -266,10 +267,21 @@ public class PMDTaskImpl {
         try {
             doTask();
         } finally {
+            tryClose(configuration.getClassLoader());
             logManager.close();
         }
     }
 
+    private static void tryClose(ClassLoader classLoader) {
+        if (classLoader instanceof Closeable) {
+            try {
+                ((Closeable) classLoader).close();
+            } catch (IOException ignore) {
+                // do nothing.
+            }
+        }
+    }
+
     private void logRulesUsed(RuleSets rules) {
         project.log("Using these rulesets: " + configuration.getRuleSets(), Project.MSG_VERBOSE);