Fake Maddie Julia Wandelt HID bombshell evidence that proved she wasn’t missing girl under mattress for two years
American investigator Dr Fia Johansson has shared a trove of ‘smoking gun’ evidence Wandelt hid at her house
FAKE Maddie Julia Wandelt hid evidence that proved she was not the missing girl under a mattress for almost two years, The Sun can reveal.
Bombshell photos Wandelt secretly stored also show her from birth onwards enjoying a happy childhood with the parents she claimed in court are not hers – which shows she knew she was not missing Madeleine all along.
She can also be seen crying and becoming hysterical in a video clip, shared with The Sun, when asked why she had picked Maddie – over other missing girls – as her target for her scam.
Wandelt, 24, is now facing deportation back to Poland after being found guilty of harassing the McCanns, after a four-week trial at Leicester Crown Court.
The court heard how she bombarded the McCann family with up to 60 calls in one day, telling Kate “You are mummy” and even turning up to their home.
Before her harassment campaign began, Wandelt had stayed for three weeks in early 2023 with a forensic psychology expert, private investigator and medium named Dr Fia Johansson, who was investigating whether there was any truth to her claims.
Dr Johansson has now shared medical evidence – a Polish childhood health document belonging to Wandelt, which sets out her height, weight, vaccination records and health concerns from birth onwards, which she found stuffed under a mattress at her home.
She also found a trove of childhood photos Wandelt had hidden on her old phone, which she left at her house.
It showed her with her family from birth onwards enjoying a happy childhood – despite claiming in court that she had no memories of her childhood.
She also claimed she did not believe her parents were her real parents and she was still 50/50 about whether she was Madeleine.
Chillingly, Dr Johansson also revealed how Wandelt watched the Netflix documentary about the McCann family over one hundred times as she created the fake memories of being Madeleine she told jurors she had experienced during hypnosis.
And she kept large files on the case stored on her phone from 2021.
The American, who has worked with US law enforcement, said she wanted to share the “smoking gun” evidence in a bid to show that Wandelt is a “dangerous and unpredictable individual” who was “fully aware of her lies and acted deliberately for fame and financial gain.”
Dr Johansson flew to Poland in February 2023 to first meet Wandelt, shortly after she had launched her I Am Madeleine McCann Instagram page, said she quickly established in a matter of days that the then 21-year-old was not Madeleine after talking to her parents, old teachers and medical staff.
But she felt sorry for Wandelt, who she thought at the time was a vulnerable young woman, and offered to pay for her to come and stay at her home in Orange County, California, to escape the online hate and death threats she was receiving on social media because of her lies.
Once in the US, Dr Johansson paid for Wandelt to do a DNA ancestry test – which proved she was of Polish, Romanian and Lithuanian heritage and undergo medical tests for health conditions she claimed to have but didn’t.
Their relationship soured when Wandelt became hysterical over the results of the DNA ancestry test and started threatening to go and see the McCanns.
Dr Johansson told her she should not go near the McCanns and wanted her to publicly apologise for pretending to be Maddie.
Then manipulative Wandelt called the police accusing Dr Johansson of holding her hostage, which was soon dismissed when officers arrived to find her living freely in her luxury multi-million dollar house.
Wandelt repeated the false allegation she was held hostage at Dr Johansson’s home in court – despite videos and photos showing her enjoying shopping trips and days out in and around Los Angeles. In one video, she can be seen dancing and singing in the car with Dr Johansson.
Dr Johansson then recorded an interview with Wandelt in a bid to help her tell the world she was not Maddie and that she intended to live her life as Julia and embark on a music career.
However Wandelt refused, and can be seen bursting into floods of tears when she is asked her about why she chose to impersonate Maddie – rather than any other missing girl – in a video clip shared with The Sun.
Once she left Dr Johansson’s house and returned to Poland, Julia’s lies about being Madeleine became more extreme.
Police proof
This was despite paperwork obtained by Dr Johansson from Lubin Police department in Poland from May 22, 2024, seen by The Sun, stating that officers had dismissed her claims to be missing Madeleine after verifying a birth certificate showing she was born in Poland on August 20, 2001 – two years before Madeleine, who was born in May 2003.
The verified police document, which has been translating from Polish into English, states that despite her claims she had a different blood type than her father, tests “unequivocally” showed she had the same blood type as her dad.
It goes on to say that they refused to initiate an investigation into Wandelt’s claims – as they were not true.
However Wandelt continued to claim she was Madeleine – bombarding the McCann family and their friends with texts and calls – finally even turning up to Kate and Gerry’s house in December 2024 – as she begged the family to take a DNA test with her.
She was eventually arrested in February 2025 and placed on remand in jail until her trial started last month.
It was during Wandelt’s trial – Dr Johansson’s housekeeper found her Polish medical record hidden under the mattress in the guest room she had been staying two years prior – which documented all her measurements, vaccinations and other medical details from birth onwards – proving that she knew all along she was not Maddie.
Dr Johansson sent all the evidence she had gathered including the medical information to Leicestershire Police, who confirmed to The Sun it had been passed on to investigators.
She also found the trove of childhood photographs that Wandelt had stored on an old phone she left at her house, after Dr Johansson bought her a new iPhone.
She told The Sun: “These documents and photos which she hid, proves that she knew all along that she was not Madeleine and this was all a huge scam to make money.
“She has cried in social media videos saying she is Madeleine, harassed and begged the McCanns to do a DNA test. She has tricked her followers into believing her lies and sending her money on GoFundMe pages.
“She has put the McCann family through hell – knowing all along she was born in Poland to her parents.
“I realised in three days in Poland she was not Madeleine – I saw through her scam and dirty lies. But I brought her to the United States to stop the harassment and online manipulation over her false claims. She begged me to help her, she was crying and claimed she had nowhere to go.
“She also agreed to say sorry to Kate and Gerry and move on. I wanted to make sure she was safe and the McCann family were safe.
“But it soon became clear that all she wanted the fame and money.”
“She has put the McCann family through hell – knowing all along she was born in Poland to her parents.
Dr Fia Johansson
Dr Johansson says during the time she lived with her and her family, Julia constantly lied and would turn hysterical if she didn’t get her way.
“She would act wild and aggressive if things didn’t match up with her reality. She knew that I knew the truth and I didn’t want to go along with her lies,” Dr Johansson said.
“She lied to me about her health problems, saying she had cancer, and I paid $3k for her to undergo medical exams, which showed she didn’t.
“I overheard her telling her boyfriend that this was her chance to make money.
“Her boyfriend even texted me at one point, saying he knew all along she wasn’t Maddie.
‘Watched McCann doc 100 times’
“She lived in my guesthouse with her own TV but my housekeeper and nanny told me she was just watching crime documentaries and watched the McCann one 100 times.
“That’s where she copied the BS memories she claims she has about the McCann’s from.
“She had been studying the McCann case for years and years since 2021, she had a whole file with evidence from the UK and Portuguese police investigations stored on her phone.
“These documents she hid in my house and the photos she had hidden on her phone proves that she was fully aware of her lies and acted deliberately for fame and financial gain.
“While she was staying with me, my nanny told me, ‘Fia, she is acting very weird, I don’t feel safe around her’.
‘Called police and lied’
“Then Julia called the police and lied, saying I had taken her hostage and stolen her passport and belongings. The police told her to leave my house when they saw her living here and having a luxury breakfast.
“I told the police to go to her room and check her bag and all her belongings were there.
“Then she said I had taken her phone, but the police officer said, ‘How could you call us if she had taken your phone?’ Then she shut up and started crying.
“The officer told me to kick her out but I still felt responsible for her so I bought her a ticket home.
“When I was dropping her at the airport to go home, she said I was stupid for not going along with her scam because we could have made a lot of money. But I never wanted to make any money from this.
“She wanted to scare me that because I wouldn’t go along with her lies, she would make my life miserable. She caused me a lot of emotional harm.”
Dr Johansson continued: “I do not believe she is mentally unwell, I think she knows exactly what she is doing and thought she would get away with it if she pretended she had DID or some other mental illness. She tried to get an online doctor to give her a certificate stating she had DID when I first got involved with her – so she could protect herself.
“She told me, ‘Don’t be scared they can’t do anything with crazy people’ and she kept the lies alive for years thinking no one could stop her.
“I want the world to know that Julia is a dangerous and unpredictable individual and is capable of extreme actions to gain attention.
“This evidence also proves that she lied under oath in court.”
Wandelt was found not guilty of stalking causing serious harm and distress but guilty of a lesser charge of harassment after the trial.
“I want the world to know that Julia is a dangerous and unpredictable individual and is capable of extreme actions to gain attention.
Dr Fia Johansson
She was handed the maximum sentence of six months – but has already spent longer in custody on remand and is now facing deportation back to Poland.
Judge Mrs Justice Cutts told Wandelt she accepted she “had not had an easy childhood” and had issues over who her natural parents were.
But she added: “That does not begin to justify the way you behaved,” adding: “Your constant pestering and badgering was unwarranted, unkind, and as the jury has found, criminal.”
Imposing a restraining order to protect the McCanns, she told Wandelt: “In my view you do pose a significant risk of the harassment of the McCanns in future.”
Wandelt’s friend Karen Spragg, 61, was found not guilty of stalking and walked free.
Kate and Gerry McCann, their children Sean and Amelie and friends of the family all gave evidence to the court about how Wandelt had “relentlessly” harassed them.
Wandelt claimed to them that she “remembered” her early life with the McCanns and had the same eye condition and moles as Maddie.
Amelie McCann, 20, who testified via videolink, said she received Facebook messages and a letter through the post from Wandelt, telling her she remembered playing Ring a Ring o’ Roses with her and twin brother Sean – and sending images that had been edited to “make me look more like her” from April 2024.
Sean McCann described the claims as “upsetting and disrespectful” telling the court: “If she is fully aware she is not Madeleine, then this is very upsetting for me”.
Kate and Gerry gave evidence to the court behind a blue curtain to protect their privacy as they spoke of their anger and distress at Wandelt’s numerous calls, Whatsapp messages and visit to their home.
Kate said she became very distressed when Wandelt appeared at her door in December 2024 calling her “mum” alongside Spragg- and asked them both to leave.
Wandelt then posted a letter to the next day to “mum” and signed from “Madeleine”, the court heard.
Kate said: “It was the thing I wanted the most – through all this pain – for Madeleine to be back and calling me ‘mum’.”