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A Polish woman who falsely claimed to be Madeleine McCann stalked the missing girl's parents by sending emails, making phone calls, turning up at their address, and even claiming she remembered them hugging her, a court has heard. Jurors at Leicester Crown Court were told there is unequivocal scientific evidence that Julia Wandelt, 24, from Lubin in south-west Poland, has no familial link to Kate and Gerry McCann, despite her claims of memories from the girl's childhood and disappearance.

Wandelt and Karen Spragg, 61, of Caerau Court Road in Caerau, Cardiff, deny a count of stalking causing serious alarm and distress to the McCanns between June 2022 and February this year. Wandelt started audibly crying and went to the back of the dock when prosecutor Michael Duck KC said on Monday: "Can we at this very early stage in the trial make this position clear - that Julia Wandelt is not Madeleine McCann." She then returned to the dock beside Spragg after a 10-minute break to listen to the rest of the hearing.

Opening the Crown's case, Mr Duck told the jury of five men and seven women that from June 2022, Wandelt began trying to persuade anybody prepared to listen that she was Madeleine.

Mr Duck said: "Her contention over the two and a half years that followed was therefore that she must have been abducted and taken to Poland where she lived with people who she was erroneously told were her parents.

"You will see and hear occasions upon which she claims to have evolving memories of what actually happened in May 2007."

Mr Duck added: "She pursued claims that she was Madeleine McCann and she pursued Madeleine McCann's parents over a period of time and pursued that myth."

Madeleine McCann disappeared on May 3 2007 from an apartment in Praia da Luz on the coast of Portugal. She was nine days short of her fourth birthday.

Mr Duck said: "One of many tragic consequences for Madeleine's parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, has been their constant inability to escape the glare of publicity that came with that tragedy.

"The attention they have received has not always been compassionate, sometimes far from it.

"There remains a group of individuals who continue to fail to acknowledge their plight and perpetuate conspiracy theories."

Unfortunately, the two defendants in the dock "belonged to that latter group", he stressed.

Mr Duck said: "You will hear unequivocal scientific evidence in this case that Madeleine McCann is the natural daughter of Kate and Gerry McCann. Julia Wandelt has no familial link to them."

Wandelt has claimed to have memories of being part of the McCann family and remembers growing up with Madeleine's younger siblings, Mr Duck pointed out.

He said: "Nothing gives you the right to pursue and stalk people just because you want them to bend to your will and do as you demand or request.

"There could never have been a legitimate belief by Julia Wandelt that she was Madeleine McCann. At the time of Madeleine McCann's disappearance, Julia Wandelt was not of the same age."

Mr Duck said Wandelt obtained numerous images of Madeleine McCann but also other images of the McCann family and sought to compare them to images of herself.

The court heard that Wandelt sent images to Madeleine's younger sister to persuade her that they were somehow related.

Madeleine's disappearance during a family holiday at the age of three in Portugal's Algarve in 2007 remains unsolved.

The court also heard that the woman who falsely claimed to be Madeleine McCann has claimed to be two other missing girls.

Mr Duck told the jury: "In the time between 2022 and her arrest in 2025, Julia Wandelt did not limit her claims to be a missing girl to the tragic case of Madeleine McCann.

"By the latter part of February 2023, she had now asserted she was potentially two different missing girls."

The court heard that Wandelt contacted a charity called Missing Years Ago, which helps with historic missing person cases, in January or February 2023, dates which coincided with Julia Wandelt's assertion she was Madeleine McCann.

Mr Duck said: "The initial contact with the charity was not to contend that she was Madeleine McCann but rather to suggest that she was another missing girl, Inga Gehricke."

Mr Duck said: "Inga was a young girl who had disappeared in Germany, but as with Madeleine McCann, Julia Wandelt was precluded from being a realistic candidate by virtue of her age and obvious differences."

On a separate occasion, the jury heard, Wandelt claimed to be another missing girl called Acacia Bishop.

The jury was told that Wandelt called and messaged Mrs McCann's phone on more than 60 occasions on one day in April last year, which she did not respond to.

In one message, the court heard, Wandelt said: "I remember how you hugged me and a pink teddy bear."

A voicemail left on Mrs McCann's phone was played to the jury in which Wandelt said: "You have nothing to lose, if I'm her then everybody should be okay but if I'm not, as you probably think, then I will leave you alone.

"I know my accent is Polish because I live here, I know I look fat and I know I'm not pretty like Madeleine was in the past, but I know what I know, I know what I remember.

"Please just give me a chance, I'm not a liar, I'm not crazy - I just want to know the truth. Call me or message me or whatever please."

Mr Duck explained: "The refusal to respond by Mrs McCann did not deter Julia Wandelt."

Wandelt also claimed to have flashbacks from hypnosis sessions, including one memory of spoon-feeding Madeleine's younger brother.

The court heard Wandelt emailed Mr McCann in June 2023 and messaged Madeleine's younger sister on other occasions saying there were many things she could remember, and that she would never lie.

The trial will continue on Tuesday morning.

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