Fact Check

Florida Man Marries a Baby

Rumor: A Florida man has 'married' a 6-month-old boy.

Published May 2, 2015

Claim:

Claim:   A Florida man has "married" a 6-month-old boy.


FALSE


Example: [Collected via Facebook, April 2015]


This is creepy and disturbing. I hope this is not true and is fake.

Florida Man Marries a Baby


Origins:   On 16 March 2015, the entertainment web site Stuppid published an article reporting that a Florida man had paid a couple $1,000 to allow him to "marry" their 6-month-old son:


Jesse Nicely paid a poor Florida couple $1,000 to allow him to marry their 6-month-old son, Jason. The marriage is not official as it is illegal to marry babies in Florida, but according to the parents and Nicely, they signed a contract that states the baby is Nicely's husband and when the child turns 16 they will be allowed to become legally married.

Although this Stuppid article was shared widely across social media, there is no truth to the claim that a man in Florida (where same-sex marriage was legally recognized on 6 January 2015) named Jesse Nicely will be "marrying" a 6-month-old child named Jason. Stuppid is a fake news outlet that does not publish

factual articles; that site has previously offered a myriad of bogus news items about subjects such as a 14-year-old giving birth to Jesus, a mother-daughter lesbian relationship, and a Neo-Nazi woman being inseminated with sperm from a black donor.

Moreover, the image that accompanies this article is not a photograph of "Jesse Nicely" and "Jason," but rather a stock image titled "Man in tuxedo holding his son." (The repurposing of photographs is a key signal that a purported news story is not on the up-and-up.)

Stuppid's disclaimer notes that the site aims to publish the "stupidest, craziest stuff we can find" on the internet.

Last updated:   2 May 2015

David Mikkelson founded the site now known as snopes.com back in 1994.