Android : How can this SimpleCursorAdapter work fine?

So I have an old problem: code works fine while is shouldn't. Can anyone guess how is it possible?

I'm showing a list of contacts, with photo thumbnail for each contact. Returned Cursor data does not have any photo thumbnail data, yet thumbnail is shown correctly for each contact.

List item view:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout
    xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:orientation="horizontal"
    >

    <ImageView
        android:id="@+id/userpic"
        android:layout_width="150dp"
        android:layout_height="150dp"
        android:contentDescription="Userpic"
        />

    <TextView
        android:id="@android:id/text1"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_weight="1"
        android:clickable="true"
        android:textSize="24sp"
        android:padding="12dp"
        android:layout_gravity="center_vertical"
        />
</LinearLayout>

The main code

private static class CursorAdapter extends SimpleCursorAdapter {
    private static final String[] FROM = new String[]{
            Contacts.DISPLAY_NAME_PRIMARY,
            Contacts.PHOTO_THUMBNAIL_URI
    };
    private static final int[] TO = new int[]{
            android.R.id.text1,
            R.id.userpic
    };

    public CursorAdapter(Activity activity, Cursor c) {
        super(activity, R.layout.contacts_item, c, FROM, TO, 0);
    }

    @Override
    public View newView(Context context, Cursor cursor, ViewGroup parent) {
         // Here I logged cursor contents and am sure that thumbnail column data is null.
        dumpCursorCurrent(cursor);

        View view = super.newView(context, cursor, parent);

        int columnIndex = cursor.getColumnIndexOrThrow(Contacts.PHOTO_THUMBNAIL_URI);
        String thumbnailUriString = cursor.getString(columnIndex);
        if (thumbnailUriString != null) {
            throw new RuntimeException("Never comes here");
        }
        return view;
    }
}

code that creates Cursor:

    ContentResolver contentResolver = getActivity().getContentResolver();
    Cursor c = contentResolver.query(
            Contacts.CONTENT_URI,
            projection,
            null,
            null,
            null
    );

So the list has proper photos for each contact that has the photo.

I debugged SimpleCursorAdapter code, and it shouldn't work, it calls imageView.setImageURI(Uri.parse("")), and naturally logs a warning for each row:

09-03 01:47:20.023 27814-27814/me.lazerka.mf.android E/BitmapFactory﹕ Unable to decode stream: java.io.FileNotFoundException: /: open failed: EISDIR (Is a directory) 09-03 01:47:20.023

27814-27814/me.lazerka.mf.android I/System.out﹕ resolveUri failed on bad bitmap uri:

So who sets the proper imageURI for each ImageView, and where does it take it (cursor has null always)?