Accused Stalker Questioned: 'However Suppose I Could Be Madeleine?'
A woman charged with pursuing Kate McCann allegedly recorded her a phone message which asked: "what if I am Madeleine?"
The defendant, 24, who witnesses stated has consistently asserted she was the vanished Madeleine McCann, and her co-defendant are standing trial accused with harassing Kate and Gerry McCann between June 2022 and February the current year.
On Monday, Leicester Crown Court was told phone records and evidence obtained from phones documented Ms Wandelt repeatedly demanding Madeleine's mother for a DNA test over 2023 and 2024.
Madeleine's vanishing in 2007 - as a three-year-old during a family holiday in Portugal - is considered the most widely reported investigations and continues to be unsolved.
'I Don't Want Money'
Another recorded message, played in court, captured Ms Wandelt declaring: "I realize I'm heavy and plain like Madeleine had been, but I feel what I know."
While one recording of Ms Wandelt's one-way conversations with Mrs McCann's answerphone expressed: "What if there is a small chance that I'm her? What happens next? Is that not crucial for you?"
"I don't want money, I possess a life here in Poland, I only wish to discover," the message continued.
The jury was informed that via electronic messages, mobile messages and phone calls, Ms Wandelt demanded a genetic test, transmitted childhood photos to her phone in a effort to demonstrate a resemblance to Mrs McCann's missing daughter, and asserted to have "memories" from a youth with the McCanns.
An intelligence analyst, a data specialist with Leicestershire Police who collated the information, informed the court there "didn't appear to be any replies" from Mrs McCann.
Ms Wandelt additionally contacted close associates of the McCanns, based on the communication logs.
On that date, the father responded to a phone call from Ms Wandelt to his wife's phone, saying she had "the wrong phone."
That day Ms Wandelt recorded a voicemail on Mrs McCann's voicemail declaring "I will continue and I will prove my point."
The court was informed the co-defendant developed a connection through digital means with Ms Wandelt before accompanying her on a visit to the McCanns' home in Leicestershire in last December.
Call logs demonstrated Mrs Spragg had contacted via communication app to Mrs McCann to state the news outlets had portrayed Ms Wandelt as "mentally unstable" but that she ought to be taken seriously in the months preceding the visit to that location, that area, in that winter.
The court was told communications between the two individuals, in November 2024, planning trying to obtain Mrs McCann's genetic material from her bins or from silverware at a restaurant.
"We need to make a stand," Mrs Spragg advised Ms Wandelt.
On the night of the appearance to their house, the defendant transmitted a text which stated: "We are sitting outside the McCanns' residence with our headlights off similar to private investigators. I desired to do this with another person I didn't imagine I would be involved in this with the McCanns."
The case ongoing.
