Alleged stalker asked ‘what if I am Madeleine?’
A woman charged with stalking Kate McCann left her a voicemail message which a court heard asked “what if I am Madeleine?”
Julia Wandelt, 24, who a jury heard has repeatedly claimed she was missing Madeleine McCann, and Karen Spragg are on trial charged with stalking Kate and Gerry McCann between June 2022 and February this year.
On Monday, Leicester Crown Court heard that call records and data recovered from phones logged Ms Wandelt repeatedly asking Madeleine’s mother for a DNA test throughout 2023 and 2024.
Ms Wandelt, of Jana Kochanowskiego in Lubin, Poland, and Mrs Spragg, 61, of Caerau Court Road, Cardiff, deny the charges.
PA MediaMadeleine’s disappearance in 2007 – at the age of three during a family holiday in Portugal – is one of the most widely reported missing child cases and remains unsolved.
Ms Wandelt, who the court has heard since 2022 has claimed to be Madeleine, and her co-defendant Mrs Spragg deny stalking the McCanns, causing serious alarm and distress.
The prosecution, in its opening speech to jurors, said Ms Wandelt claimed to be Madeleine and “pursued that myth” by stalking the missing girl’s parents by sending emails, making phone calls and turning up at their address.
One message left on Mrs McCann’s answerphone, which was recorded and recovered from Ms Wandelt’s two phones after her arrest on arriving in the UK in February 2025, said: “I know you probably think that Madeleine is dead, but she is not.”
‘I don’t want money’
Another voicemail, played in court, recorded Ms Wandelt saying: “I know I’m fat and not pretty like Madeleine was, but I know what I know.”
Meanwhile, another recording of Ms Wandelt’s one-way conversations with Mrs McCann’s answerphone said: “What if there is a small chance that I’m her? What then? Isn’t that important for you?
“I don’t want money, I have a life here in Poland, I just want to know.”
The jury was told that via emails, text messages and calls, Ms Wandelt asked for a DNA test, sent childhood photos to her phone in a bid to show a likeness to Mrs McCann’s missing daughter, and claimed to have “flashbacks” from a childhood with the McCanns.
Robert Jones, an intelligence analyst with Leicestershire Police who collated the data, told the court there “didn’t appear to be any replies” from Mrs McCann.
Ms Wandelt also contacted family friends of the McCanns, according to the phone records.
On 9 October 2024, Mr McCann answered a call from Ms Wandelt to his wife’s phone, saying she had “a wrong number”.
That day Ms Wandelt left a voicemail on Mrs McCann’s answerphone saying “I won’t give up and I will prove my point”.
Joe Giddens – WPA Pool/Getty ImagesThe court heard Mrs Spragg struck up a relationship online with Ms Wandelt before joining her on a visit to the McCanns’ home in Leicestershire in December 2024.
Phone records showed Mrs Spragg had reached out via WhatsApp to Mrs McCann to say the media had portrayed Ms Wandelt as “a crazy person” but that she ought to be taken seriously in the months leading up to the visit to Rothley, Leicestershire, in December 2024.
The court heard message exchanges between the two defendants, in November 2024, discussing attempting to get Mrs McCann’s DNA samples from her bins or from cutlery at a restaurant.
“We have to make a stand,” Mrs Spragg told Ms Wandelt.
On the night of the visit to their house, Mrs Spragg sent a message which said: “We are sat outside the McCanns’ home with our lights out like private investigators. I wanted to do this with Peter Andrew [sic] I never thought I would be doing that with the McCanns.”
The trial continues.
