WHEN I first saw photographs of Julia Wandelt, showing the unique coloboma eye condition Madeleine McCann had, I immediately had to reach out.
What if this was the moment the world had been waiting for? Gerry, and siblings Sean and Amelie – ending their 18 years of torment and pain.
article about her work in 2020.
She was a forensic psychology expert, medium and investigator who worked with celebrities and law enforcement and she arranged a call.
Quietly spoken and very innocent looking, Julia appeared to me – at the time – to be an extremely vulnerable young woman who said she had suffered an abusive childhood and believed the people who raised her in Poland were not her real parents.
She claimed she had no documents proving who she was and no memories from before the age of 10.
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I immediately felt sorry for her, she had a way of speaking and acting which elicited sympathy from everyone around her.
Fia had flown out to Poland to find out the truth of the situation and act as a spokesperson for her.
At the beginning, Julia always said she wasn’t claiming she was Maddie, just that she might be – but that she was open to all possibilities.
However, it soon became clear she wasn’t Madeleine, the pictures she had chosen to show to the world had been picked out and likely edited to make her look the most like her – and she was two years older.
In other pictures and videos, it was obvious she wasn’t the little girl who disappeared while on holiday with her parents in Portugal, aged three.
Fia’s investigation had quickly proven Julia was not Madeleine, she had spoken to friends, her parents and teachers and it was abundantly clear that Julia was Julia – not Maddie.
Many of her claims of a deprived childhood did not add up. Fia visited the private school she attended, which her father – a doctor – had paid for to give her the best possible start in life. He had paid for piano lessons and photography lessons.
By this point, Julia was being inundated with interview requests and messages from members of the public – some supportive, some more sinister and threatening – one message even claiming there was a 30,000 euro bounty on her head.
I felt like she had become out of her depth – a vulnerable, troubled woman who had put herself at the mercy of online trolls everywhere.
Fia decided to bring Julia back to her home in Orange County, California, to escape the death threats and undergo DNA testing and medical tests – under one condition, that she close down her social media page.
I knew Fia to be a kind-hearted woman, and she felt the same as me; this was a vulnerable young woman who had exposed herself to the world without possibly thinking of the consequences.
We’d also spoken about the Madeleine McCann case previously so I knew she had an ongoing interest in it, so it didn’t surprise me that Fia had taken Julia under her wing.
Fia had never asked for any payment for interviews; she didn’t need to as a wealthy, established woman, so I knew her reasons were not financially motivated.
‘She was a very good actress’
Fia said: “I said to her, ‘Look, you know you are not Madeleine, but now you have told the world you are, you will have to apologise.
“She had started to get threatening messages, so I offered to take her to the U.S, where she could escape from it all.
“She could do a DNA ancestry test to prove she wasn’t Madeleine, then own up and apologise to everyone.
“I said to her, ‘Look you know you are not Madeleine but now you have told the world you are, you will have to apologise.
Dr Fia Johansson
“I still thought she was a vulnerable young woman, and I wanted to help her get out of this situation and have a fresh start.”
Julia flew to Orange County, California, where she stayed in Fia’s guesthouse at her home for around three weeks.
Fia bought her new clothes, a new iPhone, paid for medical scans and tests for conditions, including cancer she claimed to have (which she didn’t) and had a DNA ancestry test taken.
After discovering that Julia had been selling pornographic photos of herself online, Fia instructed her team to contact all the websites and request that they remove them – in a bid to give her a fresh start.
Altogether, Fia spent thousands on Julia.
The results of the ancestry test proved what Fia already knew – she was of Polish descent with some Romanian and Lithuanian heritage, so she couldn’t be Maddie.
It was after this test that things took a turn.
Fia said: “She was angry about the test.
“She would scream and cry and become hysterical whenever we talked about the fact that she wasn’t Maddie. She was a very good actress.
“She said she wanted to go to the McCanns’ house and I told her: ‘Absolutely not, you have put them through enough.’
“I said she had to delete the I Am Madeleine McCann profile and start a new life as Julia Wandelt.
“I wanted to protect the McCanns and help Julia.”
Fia had spoken to Julia’s mother and father, who were devastated at their daughter’s behaviour and did not know where to turn.
Julia’s boyfriend admitted to Fia that they had known all along that she wasn’t Maddie – it was a big scam.
‘One big scam for fame and money’
Things came to a head when Julia called the police in Orange County and accused Fia of holding her hostage. No charges were ever filed against Fia.
Fia said: “I was shocked when the officers came to my door. I knew them from working with them before.
“They told me she had accused me of taking her passport, so I showed them to Julia’s room, where her passport was.
“They advised me to kick her out of my house immediately – saying I owed her nothing.
“She knew exactly who she was from the beginning, this was just one big scam for fame and money.
Dr Fia Johansson
“Even though I was angry I couldn’t just leave her stuck in America with nowhere to go, so I booked her a ticket home and took her to the airport.
“Before she left my house, she said, ‘Fia, I thought you were smart and we could make money, but you are stupid’.
“She told my assistant to give her all my media contacts because she was going to go behind my back and make money.
“She knew exactly who she was from the beginning; this was just one big scam for fame and money.”
In May 2024, according to a police document seen by The Sun, Julia reported to Lubin police that she could be Madeleine, that she has no memories of her childhood and has a different blood type to her parents.
Police state that they obtained her birth certificate, found that she does have the same blood type as her father and proved she was not Madeleine.
But even this did not stop Julia, and things started to escalate.
She no longer claimed she might be Maddie; she claimed she was Maddie and set up multiple social media accounts where she would post her fake claims.
“She [Julia] would scream and cry and become hysterical whenever we talked about the fact she wasn’t Maddie. She was a very good actress.
Dr Fia Johansson
Julia accused Fia of faking the DNA ancestry test and would post long, emotional videos begging the McCanns to do a DNA test.
People started donating thousands to her GoFundMe.
Last December, Julia reached out to me with a DNA test she claimed proved she was related to the McCanns and begged me to do a story about it.
Fia said she knows the DNA profile was generated by AI with the help of a friend – as the friend admitted it to her.
Julia messaged me several times, on one occasion offering me “unpublished” photos of Sean and Amelie if I were to do her story.
Last October, she wrote: “I got an opinion from a forensic expert. He answered my email. He says I am closely related to the person from this genetic profile (Madeleine’s DNA profile).
“He said it is a relationship between child and parent or full siblings. I can show you his opinion because it is large evidence.
“Let me know if you can help me by writing something good and true about my current situation regarding Madeleine McCann case. I am related to them. Read it please.”
I had long lost sympathy for Julia and saw her for the manipulative opportunist that she was.
Back in 2023, she had left her old phone at Fia’s house, and while transferring her contents to her new phone, Fia alleges she discovered a number of explicit images of what appeared to be minors.
She went straight to the police over the images and handed over Julia’s phone.
At the time a spokesperson for Orange County Police Department said: “Our investigation is taking a deep look into it and we’re going to let them do their investigative duties and then from that point let the judicial system take over – if it needs to.”
Wandelt told me the images must have been planted on her phone, telling me: “I am not a paedo and I never tried to encourage any teenagers to do anything illegal and bad and disgusting… It’s all one big crazy lie!”
‘I met Kate and Gerry’
Then last December, after months of social media posts and appearances on various YouTube channels, Wandelt posted a recording of her visiting Kate and Gerry at their home.
Terrified Kate was in floods of tears as Julia – and her online pal Karen Spragg – appeared at her door.
“Kate was crying like a baby”, Julia told me after her first meeting.
She wrote to me: “Yes, I met Kate and Gerry, now I have more evidence than before. Kate’s reaction said everything to me…
“Why would Kate start crying immediately when she saw me? My friend was there with me so I have a witness.”
I asked her why she could not just take a DNA test with one of her own family members in Poland – rather than bothering the McCanns.
But she was insistent the McCanns should do a DNA test with her.
She wrote: “Why have Kate and Gerry never reported me to the police? Why have they never done DNA test with me? If they are sure that I am not their missing daughter Madeleine, they should rule me out.
“Actually, looking at Kate’s reaction, it gave me my answers but I also think that DNA test is very needed. This is the only way to officially prove my identity.
Kate started crying in the moment she saw me. Why would she cry like a baby if I am just a random stranger? Why?
Julia Wandelt
“I have gathered a lot of evidence so far. I have memories (most of them are very difficult to talk about)…
“In my opinion Kate knows who I am and I think that her tears and words at the end of conversation (‘There is nothing you can do’ ) speak volumes.
“Why would she be so broken if I am not Madeleine? Why would she say something like that if I am not her daughter? She was very emotional. Gerry was so cold.”
Julia had amassed a band of loyal followers who believed every fake word she said – and were demanding the McCanns do a DNA test.
I reached out to the McCanns’ campaign and told them about Julia’s messages, who asked me not to report on it – they did not see what good it would do reporting on who they believed was a vulnerable woman.
Fia, who had been inundated with threats and smears from Julia’s cult-like followers, contacted Leicestershire police, telling them everything she had learned about Julia.
Eventually, on February, 19, 2025, Julia was arrested at Bristol Airport and charged on suspicion of stalking involving serious alarm and distress. She was detained alongside her friend Karen Spragg. They had planned to visit the McCanns again.
One last shock discovery
Fast forward to October 2025, Fia was about to make another host of discoveries over in California.
A Polish medical document belonging to Julia, containing all her weight, measurements and vaccinations, from birth onwards, had been hidden under a mattress in the guest room where Julia had been staying.
Her housekeeper made the discovery nearly two years after she had stayed there.
Fia then checked her computer, where the contents of Julia’s phone had been transferred to the new phone she had bought her and discovered files of childhood photos she had unwittingly left there, showing her with her mother, father, stepmother, grandparents and other family members from a newborn all the way to primary school.
This was despite Julia’s claims in court that she had no memories of her childhood and did not believe the people who raised her were her real parents.
There were also files and files on the disappearance of Madeleine McCann – Julia had been studying the case from at least 2021.
Julia knew she was not Madeleine all along – but continued her harassment and lies anyway.
Fia sent this new evidence to police and prosecutors.
After a four week trial at Leicester Crown Court, jurors found Julia guilty of harassing the McCanns – but not guilty of the more serious charge of stalking.
Julia Wandelt has dragged the already traumatised McCann family through an unnecessary hell, forcing them to appear in a dramatic court case, where they felt so vulnerable they asked for a screen to protect them from the world’s prying eyes, and relive some of their worst moments.
And as Gerry McCann stated in court, her unhinged scam has severely damaged efforts in the ongoing search for Madeleine.
Julia has also turned the lives of her own family upside down.
While her parents have declined interviews, I understand they are both at a loss as to why their daughter has disowned them and behaved this way.
Julia’s dad has had to take time off at the hospital he works at during the trial because he’s so embarrassed of his daughter’s behaviour.
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Her mother and her new husband have been forced to leave Poland and the business they have built up over many years, to escape and start a new life in another country because of the attention they’ve received.
Julia Wandelt is one of the world’s worst internet scammers, is now facing deportation back to Poland, and is lucky to have escaped with only a harassment conviction.
