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An alleged stalker who insisted to be Madeleine McCann was eliminated after a secret DNA test proved conclusively she was not Madeleine McCann, police have revealed in court.

Targeted Behavior Against McCann Family

Julia Wandelt, twenty-four, faces charges for a campaign of harassment against the parents of Madeleine, who disappeared from Praia da Luz in Portugal in 2007 when she was three.

The Polish national flooded Kate and Gerry McCann and their older offspring, Sean and Amelie, with countless communications, messages, voicemails and letters over a period spanning 2022 to this year, and visited their home insisting on a DNA test, the court was earlier informed.

Investigation Details

Testifying on Tuesday, the lead detective on the missing person’s case, said he had deviated from protocol to test Wandelt “with the aim she may stop her behavior towards the McCann family”.

Detective Chief Inspector Mark Cramwell said thirteen individuals had earlier asserted to be the abducted child but that: “We would not take DNA unless we believed that person was Madeleine because I aimed to prevent setting a precedent.

“If it was revealed in the media I had taken DNA off an individual most likely not to be Madeleine, I was concerned I would have had a lot of people coming forward saying ‘I’m Madeleine’.

“I genuinely have 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 quite emotionally damaging and challenging for the family.”

DNA Comparison

He said investigators had previously assessed Wandelt not to be Madeleine on account of no physical similarity and that she was two years older than Madeleine. But, he said, after discovering Leicester police were going to take into custody Wandelt on stalking charges, he “decided that the DNA would be taken during detention”.

He declared: “Analysis occurred. It conclusively proved that Julia Wandelt is definitely not Madeleine McCann.”

Court Proceedings

The court heard that in April this year, the officer visited Wandelt in custody and stated to her that her DNA had been compared to Madeleine’s and that the samples did not match. The jury heard he told Wandelt at that meeting: “You are not Madeleine McCann.”

Testimony indicated that throughout their discussion, Wandelt inquired: “Do you really want 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 manipulated the sample”, stating: “There was a possibility she would never accept she cannot be Madeleine notwithstanding scientific proof.”

Family Impact

Earlier in the trial, the court heard how the relatives were left scared and upset by their “unnerving” and “deeply disturbing” interactions with Wandelt and her alleged accomplice Karen Spragg, 61, from Cardiff, as the two women attempted to insist on a DNA test.

The jury were told how the defendants made ever more strange plans” to obtain Kate McCann’s DNA, which included searching the McCanns’ bins and stealing utensils from restaurants that the McCanns dined at.

The accused women both refute one count of stalking. Proceedings are ongoing.