Secret DNA Examination Confirmed Accused Stalker Could Not Be Madeleine McCann, Says Investigator

An alleged stalker who asserted to be the missing girl was ruled out after a confidential DNA test definitively confirmed she was not the long-lost child, authorities disclosed in court.

Stalking Allegations Against McCann Family

Julia Wandelt, 24, is accused of a pattern of threatening behavior against the parents of Madeleine, who went missing from Praia da Luz in Portugal in 2007 as a three-year-old.

The Polish national flooded Kate and Gerry McCann and their grown-up kids, Sean and Amelie, with numerous phone calls, messages, voicemails and letters from 2022 until recently, and visited their home requesting a DNA test, jurors learned during proceedings.

Police Testimony

Giving evidence on Tuesday, the lead detective on Operation Grange, stated he had gone against procedure to test Wandelt “intending she may stop her behavior towards the McCann family”.

The senior officer said thirteen individuals had in the past insisted to be the missing girl but that: “We would not take DNA unless we believed that person was Madeleine because I did not want setting a precedent.

“If it got out in the media I had taken DNA from a person quite likely not to be Madeleine, I was anxious I would have had a lot of people coming forward saying ‘I’m Madeleine’.

“I truly possess major concerns about contacting the family to say I intend to take DNA from an individual – that could have raised their hopes. It could have been quite emotionally damaging and hard for the family.”

DNA Comparison

He said authorities had previously assessed Wandelt not to be Madeleine because 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 criminal accusations, he “decided that the DNA would be taken when she was apprehended”.

He stated: “Analysis occurred. It definitively established that Julia Wandelt cannot be Madeleine McCann.”

Court Proceedings

Jurors learned that in April this year, the detective visited Wandelt while detained and told 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 asked: “Do you truly desire to find Madeleine?”, and the detective told the jury he answered: “Yes.”

He said notwithstanding the evidence, he believed Wandelt “could allege we have tampered with the sample”, adding: “There existed a chance she would never accept she isn't Madeleine notwithstanding scientific proof.”

Family Impact

Earlier in the trial, testimony revealed how the family were left terrified and upset by their “creepy” and “deeply disturbing” interactions with Wandelt and her co-defendant Karen Spragg, 61, from Cardiff, as the two women attempted to push for a DNA test.

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

Wandelt and Spragg both deny one count of stalking. Proceedings are ongoing.