In June 2026, people shared a story alleging police arrested a woman living in Memphis, Tennessee after she listed her husband for sale on the buy-and-sell platform Facebook Marketplace, priced at either $100 or best offer.
For example, on June 14, an X user posted (archived) the story with the headline, "Memphis Woman Arrested After Listing Husband on Facebook Marketplace for $100 or Best Offer." Others shared the same story on Facebook (archived), Threads (archived) and X (archived).
(@Soaringeagle45 accessed via X)
The story in the posts — featuring an alleged mug shot of the woman police arrested — begins in part:
MEMPHIS, TN — In what experts are calling "the most honest Facebook Marketplace listing of 2026," a 47-year-old Memphis woman was arrested after allegedly putting her husband up for sale online with a starting bid of $100 or best offer.
The seller, identified as Tammy Sue Pickens, posted photos of her 49-year-old husband, Ricky Dale Pickens, standing in the driveway holding a weed eater he reportedly hasn't used since the Obama administration.
According to the story, the listing resulted in more than 1,200 messages and at least three marriage proposals from women. Police allegedly intervened after Tammy Sue Pickens reportedly started creating a spreadsheet titled "Potential New Owners."
The story wasn't real, however. In sum, a Facebook user who labels his posts with a "satire" hashtag originated it. That user, Cliff Messer, first posted the tale on June 12. The satire hashtag appears at the very end of the post.
Snopes messaged Messer to ask for more information about the artificial intelligence tool he appeared to use to generate the fake mug shot image, as well as potentially to write the text of the story. We will update this article if we receive a response.
Researching the rumor
Searches of Bing, DuckDuckGo, Google and Yahoo failed to locate any news media outlets reporting about police arresting a woman named Tammy Pickens for attempting to sell her husband — whether intended as a joke or not — on Facebook Marketplace. If the
A reverse image search for the mug shot image only found reposts of the fictional story, as opposed to official accounts of a genuine arrest.
Messer's Facebook page featured other posts with fictional stories about Memphis residents paired with AI-looking images. An examination of some images found an overly smooth skin appearance as one sign of AI, for example.
For further reading, we previously investigated another arrest rumor involving a woman who allegedly posed as a Costco employee and handed out 220 meatball samples.
Editor's Note: Since the effectiveness of satire is subjective, we use "originated as satire" or "labeled satire" ratings based on creators' descriptions of their work.