Larry Millete Murder Trial: Charges, Evidence, and Defense

Larry Millete is standing trial for the first-degree murder of his wife, May “Maya” Millete, in San Diego County Superior Court in Chula Vista, where prosecutors are presenting a circumstantial case built on his communications with online spellcasters, incriminating Google searches, twelve unaccounted-for hours of driving the day after Maya vanished, and testimony from her family about his controlling behavior. Maya disappeared from the couple’s San Miguel Ranch home on January 7, 2021, and her body has never been found. Larry was arrested in October 2021, pleaded not guilty, and has been in custody ever since. Opening statements in the Larry Millete murder trial concluded on May 18, 2026, before Superior Court Judge Enrique Camarena.¹

The Charges and What He Faces

Larry Millete was charged with one count of murder under California Penal Code 187 and one count of illegal possession of an assault weapon. He pleaded not guilty on October 21, 2021.² If convicted of first-degree murder, he faces up to 25 years to life in state prison.³

The trial was expected to last approximately three months, with 12 jurors and 6 alternates seated.⁴ Prosecutors identified roughly 152 potential witnesses. The case had already been delayed several times before it reached trial. Judge Camarena, expressing frustration with the pace, warned at one point that “there does come a point where delay no longer serves justice, but begins to erode it.”³

How Maya Millete Disappeared

Maya Millete, 39, was a civilian Navy employee and mother of three. By late 2020 the marriage was failing. In an August 2020 note she wrote to Larry: “It’s unhealthy, it’s toxic, we need to change. I want to be happy and happy is not with you.”¹ She was researching divorce attorneys and child support calculations, and had begun estate planning for her children.⁵

On January 4, 2021, Maya messaged her sisters saying she needed $10,000 for divorce attorneys.⁶ On January 6, she told a friend she had informed Larry she planned to file. On January 7, she scheduled an attorney appointment for January 12.⁷ Surveillance video captured her parking her Jeep in front of the home at 4:42 p.m. that day. Her last Google search happened at 8:12 p.m., her last Messenger activity at 8:15 p.m., and all cellular data from her phone ended at approximately 1:25 a.m. on January 8.⁸

She never made the divorce appointment, never used her credit cards again except through automatic payments, never entered a military installation, and was never recorded crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.⁵ A neighbor’s surveillance system recorded a single loud bang from the direction of the Millete home at 8:45 p.m. on January 7 and a series of eight loud bangs shortly before 10 p.m. The FBI was consulted but could not identify the source.⁹

The Prosecution’s Evidence

Prosecutors have acknowledged they cannot prove exactly how Maya died. There is no body, no confirmed crime scene, and no eyewitness. Former U.S. Attorney Mark Conover told NBC San Diego a circumstantial case can be more effective with juries than complex scientific evidence because jurors can directly weigh “behavior, emotion and motive.”¹⁰

Payments to Spellcasters

According to investigator James Rhoades, Larry spent $1,154.05 on roughly 70 spells between September 2020 and January 2021.¹¹ Prosecutors introduced more than 500 pages of text messages between Larry and a spellcaster named Frank Peavey, who went by “Mystic Lunar.”¹²

Early requests were for love spells to keep Maya in the marriage and to “banish everyone from her life with the exception of family.” Larry also paid for voodoo hexes against Jamey Laird, the man Maya was seeing, wishing Laird would “suffer tenfold.”¹³ By October 2020, the tone shifted. Larry asked that Maya be “incapacitated” and suffer broken bones so she would depend on him. In one message he wrote: “Please punish May and incapacitate her enough so she can’t leave the house. It’s time to take the gloves off.”¹⁴ Around the time Maya told him the marriage was over, he wrote: “I’m shaking inside ready to snap.”¹⁵

On January 9, 2021, two days after Maya disappeared, Larry messaged spellcasters asking that all hexes on Maya be removed and transferred to Laird. The spellcaster communications stopped after that date.¹³

Google Searches

Between March and April 2020, Larry’s search history included “carbon monoxide death,” “shot in the heart instant death,” “painless suicide,” and “how to confuse iPhone Find Me app.”¹⁶ Later 2020 searches included “so-called date rape drugs like Rohypnol” and “how to determine if you were having a nervous breakdown.” Devices in the home also contained searches for “how to mentally torture someone with words” and “psychological torture.”¹⁷ After January 7, his searches shifted to “the Grand Canyon” and “spotless car soap.”⁵

The Missing Twelve Hours on January 8

Surveillance footage showed a black Lexus SUV being backed into the Millete garage and then leaving the neighborhood at approximately 6:45 a.m. on January 8. The vehicle did not return for roughly 12 hours, and Larry’s phone was powered off for the entire period despite having a nearly full battery.¹ His Google account was configured to automatically delete location history, with deletion events occurring up to three times per day after Maya’s disappearance.⁵

Using cell records, financial transactions, toll data, and the Lexus’s internal telemetry, investigators identified 444 miles of driving that day that could not be accounted for through known destinations. Investigator Rhoades testified the prosecution’s theory is that Larry drove to a location near or inside the Colorado River Reservation, an area the family had previously visited that sits at roughly the midpoint of those miles. Searches conducted there found nothing.¹⁸ Larry told police he had gone to Solana Beach with his son. A state parks officer and a lifeguard said they had not seen either of them at the beach.¹¹

Forensic Evidence

Former Chula Vista police specialist David Garber testified that testing in the rear of Larry’s Lexus showed a small area of potential blood and “streaks, as if the area was wiped,” though he stopped short of calling the trunk a crime scene.¹⁷ At the preliminary hearing, prosecutors introduced “blue star” chemical testing that indicated potential blood splatter in the master bathroom, and testimony about a large fire in the backyard firepit on May 19, 2021, from which a credit card was later recovered.¹¹

Digital forensic expert Cameron Laudermilk testified that emails were deleted and cleared from a MacBook associated with Maya on January 13, 2021, days after she disappeared and after Larry had turned his phone over to police.¹⁹ An email address linked to Larry was deleted ten days after Maya was last seen, destroying potential search, email, and location data.⁵

Testimony from Maya’s Family and Friends

Maya’s co-worker Kristeen Timmers testified that Maya wanted to leave Larry, feared he might harm the children or cause her to lose her job, and had limited control over the family’s finances, including roughly $150,000 in investments.¹⁶ Maya’s sister Maricris Drouaillet, who reported her missing, told the 911 operator that “my brother-in-law has a tendency to be violent,” and testified that Larry did not participate in the search for Maya. Maya’s brother, Jay-R, testified that Larry had spoken about hiring a hitman to target Jamey Laird. Their father, Pablito Tabalanza, testified that Larry had told him he owned a gun and “wanted to kill someone.”²⁰

Investigator Rhoades read excerpts from Maya’s private journals: “He abuses me physically… I’m literally afraid of your dad sometimes. He’s capable of hurting me.” A professional photographer testified that Maya had been in contact with her in December 2020 to schedule a desert photoshoot for mid-January 2021, cutting against any suggestion Maya planned to leave voluntarily.²¹

The Defense

Defense attorneys Colby Ryan and Liann Sabatini of the Virtus Law Group have challenged the thoroughness of the police investigation and emphasized Larry’s early cooperation with law enforcement. He voluntarily allowed police to photograph him on January 11, 2021, including disrobing so investigators could confirm he had no visible injuries. He also provided passwords to his devices and consented to searches of his vehicles.¹⁹ The defense called the case a tragedy but has continued to refer to Maya as “missing,” saying there are “more questions than answers.”¹

A central defense theme has been that investigators had “blinders on” and failed to adequately investigate Jamey Laird, the man Maya was having an affair with.²² That strategy has been significantly constrained by a pretrial ruling from Judge Camarena barring the defense from arguing third-party culpability, on the ground that the defense had not presented evidence meeting the legal standard required to suggest anyone other than Larry was responsible for Maya’s death.²³ Sabatini said the team had been “hamstrung” by the ruling. Their request for a limiting instruction that would allow evidence about the investigation of Laird solely to impeach investigators’ conduct was not immediately granted.

Laird did testify as a prosecution witness. He said his relationship with Maya became sexual on January 7, 2020, exactly one year before she disappeared, and acknowledged he had lied to police in multiple interviews about the extent of the affair. He also confirmed that 76% of his messages to Maya were sexual in nature. His then-wife Patricia Laird, a San Diego County sheriff’s deputy, testified that Jamey was with her at the hospital from January 7 through 10 for the birth of their child, providing an alibi for the period when Maya disappeared. Patricia also testified that she called Maya on January 5, 2021, about the affair; Maya denied it, saying she had fabricated the story “to get Larry off her back because he was crazy.”²⁴

Where the Trial Stands

As of late June 2026, the trial is ongoing at the South Bay Courthouse in Chula Vista, having reached at least its sixth week, with testimony continuing from investigators, forensic experts, and other witnesses. Maya Millete’s body has not been found. Larry Millete remains in custody, where he has been held since his October 2021 arrest, and maintains his plea of not guilty.³

Separately, the couple’s three children were placed with Maricris Drouaillet in August 2024 after a probate judge removed them from the paternal grandparents’ care.²⁵ Probate proceedings related to Maya’s estate remain ongoing and are distinct from the criminal case.

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FOX 5 San Diego. Larry Millete Trial Opening Statements
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NBC San Diego. Timeline: The Disappearance of Chula Vista Mom May Maya Millete
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NBC San Diego. Larry Millete Murder Trial Delayed
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10News San Diego. Jury Selection Begins for Larry Millete Murder Trial
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NBC San Diego. Millete Murder Trial Day 19
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NBC San Diego. Millete Murder Trial Begins
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Oxygen. Maya Millete Scheduled Appointment With Divorce Lawyer Before Disappearance
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FOX 5 San Diego. Timeline: The Disappearance of Chula Vista Mom Maya Millete
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NBC San Diego. Lead Detective in Maya Millete’s Disappearance Testifies
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NBC San Diego. Expert Says Missing Crime Scene Could Help Prosecution
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Court TV. The Search for Maya Millete
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Court TV. Spellcaster Shares Messages With Larry Millete Before Wife’s Disappearance
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NBC San Diego. Spellcasting Evidence Takes Center Stage in Millete Murder Trial
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CBS News. Maya Millete Missing: Larry Millete Spellcasters Hex
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FOX 5 San Diego. What Led to the Arrest of Larry Millete
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FOX 5 San Diego. Millete Murder Trial: Spellcasters, Search History Day 15
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FOX 5 San Diego. Millete Case Search History
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NBC San Diego. Millete Murder Trial Day 24
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10News San Diego. Day 9 of the Larry Millete Murder Trial
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FOX 5 San Diego. Larry Millete Trial Recap: One Month
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NBC San Diego. Maya Millete’s Journal Entries Claim Her Husband Larry Was Physically Abusive
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NBC San Diego. Larry Millete’s Attorneys Battle to Question Investigators About Maya’s Alleged Lover
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San Diego Union-Tribune. Man Who Had Affair With May Millete Testifies in Murder Trial
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FOX 5 San Diego. Larry Millete Murder Trial Week 6: Affair Partner, Ex-Wife
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FOX 5 San Diego. Court Grants Custody of Maya Millete’s Children to Her Sister