im trying to get form validation working.  for some reason the required field validation is working but the regex pattern validation isn't working.  here is my entity bean

@Pattern(regex = SSN)
     public void setSsn(String ssn)
     {
          this.ssn = ssn;
     }

the constant that holds the pattern

public static String SSN = "\\b(?!000)(?!666)(?:[0-6]\\d{2}|7(?:[0-356]\\d|7[012]))[- ](?!00)\\d{2}[- ](?!0000)\\d{4}\\b";

and lastly my xhtml

<s:decorate id="in_ssnDecoration" template="/layout/edit.xhtml">
                         <ui:define name="label">#{messages.show_ssn}</ui:define>
                         <h:inputText id="in_ssn" value="#{ecaTO.ssn}" required="true">
                              <a:support event="onblur" reRender="in_ssnDecoration" bypassUpdates="false" />
                         </h:inputText>
                    </s:decorate>

now one difference with my code is my entity bean is not attached to a database.  its just a transfer object container that eventually gets converted into xml and sent to a web service.  why isn't my pattern validator working?