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A suspected stalker who asserted to be the abducted child was excluded after a secret DNA test proved conclusively she was not Madeleine McCann, authorities disclosed in court.

Harassment Campaign Against McCann Family

Julia Wandelt, twenty-four, faces charges for a campaign of harassment against the family of Madeleine, who went missing from a Portuguese resort in Portugal in 2007 as a three-year-old.

The Polish citizen flooded Kate and Gerry McCann and their adult children, Sean and Amelie, with numerous phone calls, messages, voicemails and letters over a period spanning 2022 to this year, and visited their home requesting a DNA test, jurors learned during proceedings.

Police Testimony

Testifying on Tuesday, the senior investigating officer on the missing person’s case, explained he had deviated from protocol to test Wandelt “intending she may stop her actions towards the McCann family”.

DCI Mark Cramwell said 13 people had previously claimed to be the abducted child but that: “We would not take DNA unless we believed that person was Madeleine because I wished to avoid setting a precedent.

“If it became known in the media I had taken DNA off an individual quite likely not to be Madeleine, I was anxious I would have had many persons coming forward saying ‘I’m Madeleine’.

“I truly possess major concerns about reaching out to the family to say I plan to take DNA from an individual – that could have raised their hopes. It could have been highly distressing and hard for the family.”

Forensic Analysis

He said the police had previously assessed Wandelt not to be Madeleine because of no physical similarity and that she was not the same age than the missing girl. But, he said, after learning Leicester police intended to detain Wandelt on harassment allegations, he “made the decision that the DNA would be taken upon arrest”.

He declared: “A comparison took place. It definitively established that Julia Wandelt is not Madeleine McCann.”

Court Proceedings

Jurors learned that in April this year, the detective saw Wandelt in custody and stated to her that her DNA had been compared to Madeleine’s and that the samples did not match. Jurors were told he told Wandelt at that meeting: “You are not Madeleine McCann.”

Evidence showed that while they spoke, Wandelt said: “Do you truly desire to find Madeleine?”, and the officer told the jury he responded: “Yes.”

He said even with the results, he believed Wandelt “might claim we have tampered with the sample”, stating: “It was possible she would never accept she cannot be Madeleine despite being given scientific proof.”

Emotional Distress

During previous hearings, jurors learned how the family were left scared and upset by their “unnerving” and “deeply disturbing” interactions with Wandelt and her alleged accomplice Karen Spragg, 61, from Cardiff, as both defendants attempted to insist on a DNA test.

The court learned how the pair made ever more strange plans” to collect Kate McCann’s DNA, which included going through the McCanns’ bins and removing cutlery from restaurants that the McCanns dined at.

Both defendants both deny one count of stalking. The case remains active.