Are you sure you're setting the properties correctly?  
Note that the if and unless attributes take property names, not expressions.  For example, try using:
<fail if="failproperty"/> instead of <fail if="${failproperty}"/>
The <fail/> tag works in this simple example.  Try mvn package and then mvn package -Dfailproperty=true
<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/maven-v4_0_0.xsd">
    <modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
    <groupId>ant-test</groupId>
    <artifactId>ant-test</artifactId>
    <version>1.0-SNAPSHOT</version>
    <packaging>jar</packaging>
    <dependencies>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>junit</groupId>
            <artifactId>junit</artifactId>
            <version>4.7</version>
        </dependency>
    </dependencies>
    <build>
        <plugins>
            <plugin>
                <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
                <artifactId>maven-antrun-plugin</artifactId>
                <executions>
                    <execution>
                        <id>ant-test</id>
                        <phase>package</phase>
                        <configuration>
                            <tasks>
                                <junit failureproperty="fail">
                                    <classpath>
                                        <path refid="maven.plugin.classpath"/>
                                        <path refid="maven.test.classpath"/>
                                    </classpath>
                                    <formatter type="plain" />
                                    <batchtest>
                                        <fileset dir="src/test/java"/>
                                    </batchtest>
                                </junit>
                                <fail if="fail"/>
                            </tasks>
                        </configuration>
                        <goals>
                            <goal>run</goal>
                        </goals>
                    </execution>
                </executions>
                <dependencies>
                    <dependency>
                        <groupId>org.apache.ant</groupId>
                        <artifactId>ant-junit</artifactId>
                        <version>1.7.1</version>
                    </dependency>
                </dependencies>
            </plugin>
            <plugin>
                <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
                <artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>
                <configuration>
                    <source>1.6</source>
                    <target>1.6</target>
                </configuration>
            </plugin>
            <plugin>
                <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
                <artifactId>maven-surefire-plugin</artifactId>
                <configuration>
                    <skipTests>true</skipTests>
                </configuration>
            </plugin>
        </plugins>
    </build>
</project>
Assuming a Test case in src/test/java:
import junit.framework.Assert;
import org.junit.Test;
public class FakeTestCase {
    @Test
    public void testThis() {
        Assert.fail("Failure");
    }
}