An Australian judge has annulled the marriage of a Melbourne couple after the bride told the court that she took part in the wedding ceremony believing it was a social media “prank.”
According to documents published by the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia, the woman in her 20s met the man in his 30s on a dating platform in September 2023. They met in person the following day and started dating.
They cannot be named as the identities of those involved in family law proceedings in Australia are protected.
The woman told the family court that they started planning a trip to Sydney in October that year, as the man said he wanted to take her there in December.
She said the man proposed to her in late December and she accepted. Two days later they got married in a ceremony in Sydney – but the woman believed the wedding was “all an act.”
The woman said the groom had told her to attend a venue wearing a white dress because there would be a “white party” – a party at which all the guests wear white – and, since the trip had been pre-planned and they had previously attended a white party in Queensland, she “never suspected, like, anything fishy.”
She emphasized that the dress she wore was not a wedding dress, according to court documents.
When she arrived at the venue, she said, she did not see anybody else in white.
When she asked the man what was happening, he “pulled me aside, and he told me that he’s organising a prank wedding for his social media, to be precise, Instagram, because he wants to boost his content, and wants to start monetising his Instagram page,” the court heard.
She said the groom was a social media influencer – a claim that he denied, but he did admit to having more than 17,000 Instagram followers.
The woman said she thought marriages were only legal if they took place in a court, and that she called a friend to ask for advice on what was happening.
Her friend told her that she could not get legally married without filing a notice of intention to marry, according to the court documents. Reassured, the woman went ahead with the ceremony.
She told the court that she was happy “playing along” because the groom told her he could have used anyone for the video but that he wanted to use her so she would not feel jealous.
According to court documents, none of the bride’s family or friends were in attendance – the only people present were a photographer and a friend of the photographer.
The woman told the court that she was “furious” when she found out in February 2024 that the marriage was real and that it happened because the man was seeking asylum.
She said she had a streamlined process of applying for permanent residency as a health professional and, when she was about to apply, he asked her to put him as a dependent – something she believed was not possible, because she thought they were not married.
The man disputed in court that the marriage was not a regular one, and said they had lived together before becoming engaged. The woman denied this, according to court documents.
The groom told the court that he had started making plans for the wedding in November.
A notice of intended marriage dated November 20, 2023 – a month before the man had proposed – had two signatures on it. However, the bride denied seeing it or signing it, according to court documents.
In his ruling, Justice Joshua Wilson said that “it beggars belief that a couple would become engaged in late December then married two days later.” While the judge acknowledged that impulsive marriages can take place, he pointed to the fact that “a wedding celebrant had been retained over a month before” the man had proposed to the woman.
Since the man had told the court that he knew the woman was religious, the judge also commented: “Precisely why she would participate in a civil marriage and not in a church marriage ceremony went unexplored. It made no sense to me that she would.”
He concluded that the woman took part in the wedding ceremony believing it was a stunt for social media and ruled that it was not a legally valid marriage.