Using CakePHP models/controllers properly
To me your code and relations looks good! You removed the redundancy in your database by splitting the tables up. Your cake really looks cakes way to me!

Just make sure you actually do something with the exception thrown and it should be all good.



Edit : I know this is a little late, but I wanted to complete my answer for the sake of completeness.

Your code style looks pretty good to me. The functions names are well chose. What I mean by that is by putting verb first you make the function a lot easier to find and understand.

Also, putting the logic in the model is the good choice. Continue to keep thin controllers.