diff --git a/src/vm/VirtualMachineAttribute.cc b/src/vm/VirtualMachineAttribute.cc
index 73c6875f4e..9153f802a7 100644
--- a/src/vm/VirtualMachineAttribute.cc
+++ b/src/vm/VirtualMachineAttribute.cc
@@ -73,8 +73,9 @@ VirtualMachineAttribute * VirtualMachineAttributeSet::remove_attribute(
 
         if ( vma->is_flag(flag) == true )
         {
-            tmp = vma;
             a_set.erase(it);
+
+            return vma;
         }
     }