A woman who claimed she could be Madeleine McCann is not the missing girl, DNA results have reportedly shown. Julia Wendell hit the headlines when she said she could be Madeleine because of "similarities" she had noticed, but a DNA test has finally given her the answers she was searching for.
Madeleine was three when she went missing from the apartment her family were staying in in Praia da Luz in southern Portugal on May 3, 2007. Parents Kate and Gerry McCann, from Rothley, Leicestershire, had left their children sleeping in the apartment while they went out for dinner at a nearby tapas restaurant.
When Kate went to check on the children at around 10pm that night, she found Madeleine was missing, sparking a major international investigation costing millions of pounds.
Julia, 21, who also goes by the name of Julia Faustyna or Julia Wandelt, went public with her claims that she was Madeleine earlier this year but said she started to think she could be the missing girl in June last year because of similarities in their appearance, the Mirror reports.
After her claims captured the attention of those following the case, Julia even appeared on chat show Dr Phil. She told him she felt something was "wrong" because her mother did not show her affection, and when she questioned her about her childhood, she was not given any answers.
The Polish woman also claimed she asked her mum about when she was pregnant and about her birth certificate, but she would allegedly change the subject whenever it was mentioned. Julia also said every Polish child has a health book, although the first six pages of hers "are blank", elevating her concerns.
Julia said she called the Polish Embassy and the English Embassy to tell them she could be Madeleine, but said "nobody listened" - so she took to social media to share her thoughts and quickly racked up a huge amount of followers. Julia said how she has a similar defect in her iris to Madeleine, although she claims hers is a "little faded now".
Julia took a DNA test to find out more about her identity and the results have finally come back after weeks of waiting. Her DNA test results have now confirmed that she is not the missing girl, instead showing that she is from Poland, with some Lithuanian and Romanian heritage.
"She is absolutely 100 percent from Poland," Dr Fia Johansson, a private investigator and medium who has been helping Julia, has said. "She is a small percentage of Lithuanian and Russian but the test results show she is Polish," she told RadarOnline.
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Dr Johansson said Julia's work has not been in vain and she claims Julia's search for answers has been helpful to move the search for Madeleine forward. "At least Julia got the investigators to move on the McCann case – she made things happen," she said.
The young woman claimed that she doesn't want contact with her Polish parents, no matter what the DNA results would have shown. She firmly stated: "If she is my mother, I don't want to have contact with her that's all, but I believe she isn't my mother."
Julia was also read out a statement from her family during her time on Dr Phil, where she showed pictures of herself as a child to try and support her claims.
"Julia also has these photos, because she took them from the family home with the birth certificate, as well as numerous hospital discharges.
"We always tried to understand all situations that happened with Julia. Numerous therapies, medicines, psychologists and psychiatrists - Julia had it all guaranteed. She wasn't left alone," the statement read, which was released in February.
"Threats to our address from Julia, her lies and manipulations, activity on the internet. We've seen it all and we've tried to prevent it, to explain, we've asked her to stop," the statement continued.
"Julia once wanted to be a singer, a model. She always wanted to be popular. What's happening now she got one million followers.
"We're afraid Julia will carry the inevitable. The internet won't forget, and it's obvious that Julia isn't Maddie. We are devastated at this current situation."
