diff --git a/core/scrapertools.py b/core/scrapertools.py
index 5b6d4bac..06f7c6e5 100644
--- a/core/scrapertools.py
+++ b/core/scrapertools.py
@@ -41,7 +41,7 @@ def find_multiple_matches_groups(text, pattern):
 def decodeHtmlentities(data):
     import HTMLParser
     parser = HTMLParser.HTMLParser()
-    return parser.unescape(data)
+    return parser.unescape(data).encode('utf-8')
 
 
 def unescape(text):