Kate McCann has appeared in court to give evidence against the Polish woman who claims to be her missing daughter Madeleine.
The mother of missing Madeleine McCann was shielded from the dock by a curtain at Leicester Crown Court as she entered the witness box at the trial of 24-year-old Polish national Julia Wandelt and 61-year-old Karen Spragg.
Wandelt, 24, is accused of stalking 57-year-old Mrs McCann for almost three years. While Spragg has been charged with one count of stalking involving serious alarm or distress,
The judge said it was ‘entirely usual’ for some witnesses to give evidence from behind a screen and did ‘not in anyway reflect on the two defendants’.
Mrs McCann told the court she had kept the same mobile phone number since before 2007, when Madeleine vanished. When asked why she said ‘I’m not very good at technology’ adding: ‘I didn’t think I should have to (change it).
Michal Duck, prosecuting asked her about pictures of Wandelt: ‘Having had the opportunity to to look at, along with Gerry, did you conclude that she was plainly not Madeleine?’
Mrs McCann, who was softly spoken, replied: ‘Yes. I was clear it was not Madeleine.’
Mr Duck asked her is she responded to any of the messages from Wandelt. Mrs McCann replied ‘No, I did not want to engage’.
Mrs McCann was at this point asked to speak up so the jury could hear her.
Kate and Gerry McCann shortly after their daughter’s disappearance
Madeleine McCann who vanished in 2007 while on holiday in Portugal
Polish national Julia Wandelt (pictured), 24, is accused of stalking Mrs McCann for almost three years
The court was then played a rambling voicemail from Wandelt left on Mrs McCann’s phone in which she said: ‘Don’t give up on your daughter. Please don’t reject me’.
On Tuesday, jurors were told the two women parents allegedly discussed going through their bins to find DNA traces, a court heard yesterday.
Wandelt and Spragg are also said to have considered following Mr and Mrs McCann to a restaurant to steal any cutlery they used to get DNA that would ‘prove’ Wandelt was really Madeleine.
Michael Duck KC, prosecuting, said the ends to which the two women were prepared to go were ‘remarkable’.
He told Leicester Crown Court they had a discussion about taking the McCanns’ ‘garbage’ back to the hotel where they were staying, ‘as long as it doesn’t stink’. In one message Spragg said: ‘We can go through the bins lol’.
In another, she told Wandelt: ‘Shame we cant [sic] follow them to a bar or restaurant and get a knife or fork.’
Wandelt insists she is Madeleine, who was abducted aged three on May 3, 2007, from a holiday apartment in Praia da Luz, Portugal. Mr Duck had previously told jurors scientific evidence proved Wandelt, 24, could not be Madeleine, who would now be 22.
The court heard that Wandelt messaged Spragg: ‘We should get their DNA, it’s the only way to prove it.’
Spragg, 61, of Cardiff, and Wandelt, from Poland, are accused of stalking the McCanns, causing ‘serious alarm or distress’, between June 1, 2022, and February 21, 2025, which they deny.
Jurors were told yesterday how Mrs McCann, 57, was ‘visibly upset’ after being confronted at home by Wandelt.
A court sketch of Julia Wandelt and Karen Spragg
In a recording of the encounter on December 7 last year, an emotional Mrs McCann pleads with her and Spragg – who supports Wandelt’s claim to be Madeleine – to leave her driveway, telling them: ‘You are causing us a lot of distress. Stop it.’
When Mr McCann, 57, arrived moments later, they shouted at him and tried to force a letter into his hand. In the recording he tells Wandelt: ‘You need help. You are not Madeleine.’
Wandelt later posted a letter through the door of the couple’s home in Rothley, Leicestershire, in which she called Mrs McCann ‘mummy’. It was signed ‘Madeleine’, jurors were told.
Mr Duck said Spragg was ‘front and centre of the pursuit of the McCanns’. Wandelt had travelled from Poland to go to the McCanns’ house, arriving at East Midlands airport where she was greeted by Spragg in her car.
The court heard Spragg messaged a friend that read: ‘We are sat outside the McCanns home waiting for them… never thought I would be stalking the McCanns.’
The next day, a letter was put through the McCanns’ door. It began, ‘Dear Mum’, and went on: ‘Inside your heart you believe… who I am and I am your daughter.’ It ended, in what Mr Duck said was a ‘final cruel signature’ with ‘lots of love, Madeleine’.
Jurors heard that Wandelt said she remembered ‘her’ abduction, saying she was injected and was taken by a man with tanned skin. She claims the McCanns were involved in abducting Madeleine.
Wandelt was arrested in February when she arrived at Bristol airport on a flight paid for by Spragg, having made plans to go to the McCanns’ place of work. Spragg was arrested outside the airport shortly afterwards.
The trial continues.
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