After realizing that a false marriage ceremony she attended for a social media stunt was actually authentic, a person in Australia annulled her wedding.
The ignorant wedding claimed that her lover had a social media influencer who persuaded her to attend the wedding as a “prank” for his Instagram accounts.
When he attempted to use the wedding to obtain permanent residency in Australia, she was the only one who realized it was real.
In a assessment released on Thursday, a judge in Melbourne decided to annul the marriage after accepting that the woman had been duped into getting married.
The bizarre case started in September of this year when the girl met her companion on an online dating site. They started dating each additional frequently in their home town of Melbourne at the time.
In December that time, the gentleman proposed to the person and she accepted.
Two days later, the girl attended an event with the person in Sydney. She was instructed to pack a white dress and that it would be a” light party” where visitors would wear white-colored clothing.
But when they arrived she was” frightened” and “furious” to discover no other friends present except for her companion, a photographer, the photographer’s friend and a priest, according to her testimony quoted in court papers.
” But when I got it, and I didn’t notice anything in white, I asked him,’ What’s happening? ‘. And he pulled me aside, and he told me that he’s organising a game marriage for his social press, to be exact, Instagram, because he wants to boost his information, and wants to start monetising his Instagram page”, she said.
She said she accepted his explanation as “he was a social media person” who had more than 17, 000 followers on Instagram. Additionally, she argued that a civil union would not be valid if it was conducted in court.
Still, she remained concerned. The woman called a friend and expressed her concerns, but the friend laughed off and said it would be alright because they would have to file a notice of intended marriage first, which they did not do.
The woman was confident throughout the ceremony, where she and her partner exchanged wedding vows and gave candid photos. She claimed she was inspired to “play along” to “make it look real” at the time.
Her partner asked her to include him as a dependent in her application for permanent residency in Australia two months later. Both of them are foreigners.
When she told him she couldn’t because they were technically not married, he then admitted that their Sydney wedding ceremony had been genuine, based on the woman’s testimony.
The woman later discovered their marriage certificate and a notice of intended marriage that had been filed the month before their Sydney trip, which she claimed she did not sign. The signature on the notice, in the court records, does not resemble the woman’s.
” I’m furious with the fact that I didn’t know that that was a real marriage, and the fact that he also lied from the beginning, and the fact that he also wanted me to add him in my application”, she said.
In his deposition, the man claimed they had “both agreed to these circumstances” and that following his proposal the woman had agreed to marry him at an “intimate ceremony” in Sydney.
The judge ruled that the woman was “mistaken about the nature of the ceremony performed” and “did not provide real consent to her participation” in the marriage.
” She believed she was acting. She called the event ‘ a prank’. He claimed in the judgment that it made sense for her to adopt the bride’s persona throughout the entire ceremony to enhance the credibility of the video that depicts a legally binding union.
The union was dissolved in October 2024.