Invalid JSON Syntax leads to client crash in FileService

[Paxi]

com.google.gson.JsonSyntaxException: java.lang.IllegalStateException: Expected BEGIN_OBJECT but was STRING at line 1 column 1 path $
    at com.google.gson.internal.bind.ReflectiveTypeAdapterFactory$Adapter.read(ReflectiveTypeAdapterFactory.java:224)
    at com.google.gson.Gson.fromJson(Gson.java:887)
    at com.google.gson.Gson.fromJson(Gson.java:852)
    at com.google.gson.Gson.fromJson(Gson.java:801)
    at de.paxii.clarinet.util.file.FileService.getFileContents(FileService.java:46)
    at de.paxii.clarinet.util.file.FileService.getFileContents(FileService.java:50)
    at de.paxii.clarinet.util.settings.ClientSettingsHandler.onStartGame(ClientSettingsHandler.java:27)
    at de.paxii.clarinet.util.settings.ClientSettingsHandler.<init>(ClientSettingsHandler.java:16)
    at de.paxii.clarinet.Client.<init>(Client.java:74)
    at net.minecraft.client.Minecraft.init(Minecraft.java:637)
    at net.minecraft.client.Minecraft.run(Minecraft.java:482)
    at net.minecraft.client.main.Main.main(Main.java:115)
Caused by: java.lang.IllegalStateException: Expected BEGIN_OBJECT but was STRING at line 1 column 1 path $
    at com.google.gson.stream.JsonReader.beginObject(JsonReader.java:385)
    at com.google.gson.internal.bind.ReflectiveTypeAdapterFactory$Adapter.read(ReflectiveTypeAdapterFactory.java:213)
    ... 11 more