muffin-choker
n. A bizarre, sensational, or unbelievable news story.
Examples
1995
Basically — by adopting this amendment — we'll be doing what Australia, Britain, Belgium, Canada, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden have been doing — and that is that recognizing that female genital mutilation is one thing that is coming into their country solely by immigration.

That if you look at the world population — more than 100,000,000 women in more than 30 countries have been subjected to this — and as we all know, this is very painful ritual that has nothing to do with religion or health — and it usually is done to very young girls.

Most people would consider it a serious form of child abuse.

It is the cutting of a woman's genitalia — it's kind of a muffin-choker — so I really won't go into more detail — but I think most people have had and heard enough about this.
—November 17, 1995
1989 (earliest)
It's the end of the year, time to clear the computer of bizarre stories, or muffin-chokers, as they're called in the newsroom.
—Jack Thomas, “When newspapers are stranger than fiction,” The Boston Globe, December 28, 1989
Notes
This phrase comes from the reaction one would supposedly have after reading about such a story in the morning newspaper.