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A female charged with harassing Kate McCann allegedly deposited her a voicemail message which posed: "imagine I am Madeleine?"

The defendant, twenty-four, who witnesses stated has persistently declared she was the vanished Madeleine McCann, and Karen Spragg are standing trial indicted with stalking Kate and Gerry McCann between June 2022 and February 2025.

On Monday, Leicester Crown Court heard phone records and evidence recovered from phones logged Ms Wandelt consistently requesting Madeleine's mother for a DNA test throughout 2023 and 2024.

Madeleine's disappearance in 2007 - at the age of three during a trip in Portugal - is among the most covered child disappearance cases and is still open.

'I Don't Want Money'

Another voicemail, played in court, recorded Ms Wandelt stating: "I realize I'm overweight and not pretty like Madeleine had been, but I know what I believe."

While one recording of Ms Wandelt's one-way conversations with Mrs McCann's answerphone stated: "What if there is a slight possibility that I'm her? What happens next? Is that not important for you?"

"I don't want money, I possess a living here in Poland, I simply desire to discover," the recording stated.

The tribunal was told that through emails, mobile messages and phone calls, Ms Wandelt requested a genetic test, forwarded youth pictures to her phone in a bid to display a likeness to Mrs McCann's missing daughter, and claimed to have "recollections" from a childhood with the McCanns.

An intelligence analyst, an investigator with law enforcement who collated the data, told the court there "showed no any responses" from Mrs McCann.

Ms Wandelt also communicated with family friends of the McCanns, according to the phone records.

On 9 October 2024, Mr McCann picked up a communication from Ms Wandelt to his wife's phone, saying she had "a wrong number."

During that incident Ms Wandelt left a message on Mrs McCann's answerphone stating "I won't give up and I intend to demonstrate my claim."

The court was informed Mrs Spragg developed a connection online with Ms Wandelt prior to accompanying her on a trip to the McCanns' residence in Leicestershire in December 2024.

Communication data demonstrated Mrs Spragg had contacted using messaging service to Mrs McCann to state the press had portrayed Ms Wandelt as "emotionally disturbed" but that she ought to be taken seriously in the months before the appearance to Rothley, that area, in that winter.

The court heard communications between the two individuals, in November 2024, discussing trying to acquire Mrs McCann's DNA samples from her bins or from cutlery at a restaurant.

"We must make a stand," Mrs Spragg told Ms Wandelt.

On the night of the visit to their house, Mrs Spragg transmitted a communication which said: "We find ourselves sitting near the McCanns' residence with our headlights off resembling private investigators. I desired to accomplish this with Peter Andrew I didn't imagine I would be engaged in this with the McCanns."

The case proceeds.