Inside the world of the Madeleine McCann faker Julia Wendell: Polish woman who ... trends now

A memorial service was held to commemorate the 17th anniversary of the disappearance of young Madeleine McCann last night - but why was a Polish woman, clutching a note for the youngster's parents, among those attending?

Julia Wendell, 22, became infamous last year after she claimed on social media she was in fact the missing girl, who disappeared from Praia da Luz in Portugal on May 3 2007 as her parents Kate and Gerry went out for dinner.

Posting on Instagram as @iammadeleinemccann, Ms Wendell claimed she could not remember her childhood and was convinced she looked physically similar to Madeleine. Her claims horrified millions and distressed her Polish family.

A DNA test carried out with the help of celebrity psychic Dr Fia Johansson last year concluded Ms Wendell was '100 per cent Polish' - but the 'faker' nevertheless turned up at the Leicestershire memorial service hoping to ask the McCanns to take a test.

It is the latest development in what appears to be the third case of Ms Wendell claiming to be a missing person, with friends of the Polish girl's family saying that the 22-year-old - who is older than Madeleine would be now - is 'disturbed'.

The imposter grew up wanting to be a singer or a dancer and was privately educated by her mother Dorota Wandelt-Cholewinski, who runs clothes shops in Wroclaw, and finance worker stepfather Piotr Cholewinski.

But her name became known across the world after she created an Instagram account last February claiming to bear a resemblance to missing Madeleine.

Ms Wendell's claims centred on what she claimed were physical similarities between herself and the missing girl, including a coloboma - a condition that creates a black spot on the eye and was a distinguishing feature on Madeleine's face.

But her claims were denounced by many of the million-plus people who followed the Instagram account - long since deleted - and rejected by Ms Wendell's own family, who say she needs support with mental health issues. 

Madeleine disappeared at the age of three from the Algarve holiday apartment she was staying in 17 years ago as parents Kate and Gerry dined out, sparking one of the world's most infamous missing persons cases.

But Ms Wendell, who also used the surnames Faustyna and Wendelt, claimed in one of her posts to have a memory of holidaying in 'a hot place'.

She wrote: 'I don't remember most of my childhood but my earliest memory is very strong and it's about holidays in a hot place where there is a beach and white or very light coloured buildings with apartments. I don't see my family in this memory.' 

And as she shared what she claimed was evidence she was Madeleine, she begged Kate and Gerry for a DNA test to prove she was actually the missing girl. The couple have never commented directly on the baseless claims.

Julia Wendell was then contacted by Dr Fia Johansson who offered to help her conduct a DNA test to identify her roots.

And days after she appeared on US TV in a Dr Phil interview, where she continued to claim without merit that she was Madeleine, the results came back and revealed she was essentially 100 per cent Polish, with negligible Russian and Lithuanian traces. 

'At first she didn't want to believe the DNA results, she was saying 'What if someone changed the results?' but I told her, 'Stop this now',' Dr Johansson said after the results were published.

'I can understand as a psychologist why she didn't want to believe her mother is her real mother.

'But I told her - she must stop this fixation now that she is Madeleine McCann and accept the result of the DNA test and start to move on with her life.'

But it is not the first time Wendell has even claimed to be someone else.

MailOnline previously revealed she has twice contacted Zaginieni przed Laty (Missing Years Ago), a missing persons charity in Poland, purporting to be a missing German schoolgirl and a missing American toddler.

She initially claimed to be Inga Gehricke, five, who went missing from Stendal in Germany in 2015, despite an eight year age gap. Ms Wendell then contacted the charity later to say she was missing US girl Acacia Bishop.