diff --git a/Lib/test/test_zlib.py b/Lib/test/test_zlib.py
index 4440942..6b3b12e 100644
--- a/Lib/test/test_zlib.py
+++ b/Lib/test/test_zlib.py
@@ -71,6 +71,11 @@
         # verify failure on building decompress object with bad params
         self.assertRaises(ValueError, zlib.decompressobj, 0)
 
+    def test_decompressobj_badflush(self):
+        # verify failure on calling decompressobj.flush with bad params
+        self.assertRaises(ValueError, zlib.decompressobj().flush, 0)
+        self.assertRaises(ValueError, zlib.decompressobj().flush, -1)
+
 
 
 class CompressTestCase(unittest.TestCase):
diff --git a/Modules/zlibmodule.c b/Modules/zlibmodule.c
index 8cadcbc..aff165c 100644
--- a/Modules/zlibmodule.c
+++ b/Modules/zlibmodule.c
@@ -774,6 +774,10 @@
 
     if (!PyArg_ParseTuple(args, "|i:flush", &length))
 	return NULL;
+    if (length <= 0) {
+	PyErr_SetString(PyExc_ValueError, "length must be greater than zero");
+	return NULL;
+    }
     if (!(retval = PyString_FromStringAndSize(NULL, length)))
 	return NULL;