The Larry Millete Verdict

0:02January 7th, 2021. That's the last time anyone saw Maya Miliete, a 39-year-old California mother of three. In October, her husband, Larry Miliete, was arrested and charged with her murder. Five years later, he went on trial in Chula Vista, outside San Diego. And now, after the jury deliberated, we have a verdict. Miliete has been found guilty of murder. I'm CBS News legal analyst and criminal defense attorney Caroline Polisi, and this is a special episode of Case by Case. This was a largely circumstantial no-body case, one we'd covered for weeks on this podcast, with witnesses ranging from Maya's friends and family to her former lover and that man's ex-wife.

0:46And then there was the spellcaster. But even with this verdict, one question remains. Where is Maya's body? 48 Hours first reported on Maya's disappearance back in 2021 and 2022. Her sister, Mary Chris Drullier, described her lovingly. She was the gifted one, you know, she got the brains. She's very kind, very caring. She loves her kids. Maya and Larry met and married young, and both went on to work for the U.S. Navy. They waited a few years before having their three kids. When Maya vanished without a trace, Mary Chris couldn't process it. You know, I'm still in denial. Like, you know, it's like I still can't believe it's happening, that she's nowhere to be found.

1:36Like, she's nowhere. Like, she just vanished. Like, I was just talking to her. You know, we were just talking to her, and all of a sudden she's just gone. There were family and community search parties looking everywhere for Maya. But court testimony revealed there were serious problems inside the Miliete home. As we talked about in our previous episodes of Case by Case, testimony showed Maya's growing concern with Larry's efforts to control her. Mary Chris's initial 911 call played in court referenced fights and violence. And Larry's arrest warrant for Maya's murder also referenced Maya telling a friend that Larry had once choked her until she passed out.

2:20The defense has maintained there's no evidence of domestic violence between the two. Maya's sister, Mary Chris, testified that just over a week before Maya disappeared, Maya confided in her siblings that she wanted a divorce. Mary Chris told 48 Hours in 2021 something that Maya had said to her in passing once. At one point, she said, you know, if something happened to me, it would be Larry. She just kind of like throw it out and she was mentioning about, you know, the divorce. I just told her, just be careful. Just be careful because, you know, in the back of my mind, in the back of our minds, that he is capable of hurting my sister.

3:04During this time, Maya had been having an affair with co-worker Jamie Laird. Both Jamie and his ex-wife took the stand and both testified that Larry knew about the relationship and was obsessively trying to hold on to his marriage. Then there were Larry's emails. He contacted spellcasters hoping to control Maya and allegedly to punish Jamie Laird. The last confirmed sighting of Maya is camera footage of her returning home to Chula Vista the afternoon of January 7th. She was never seen leaving. There was a record of internet searches that evening from her phone, but at 1.25 a.m., cell transmission ended.

3:42The court also heard audio from a neighbor's surveillance system where multiple loud bangs were heard on the evening of Maya's disappearance. The next day, Larry's vehicle left the house in the early morning and didn't return for hours. His phone was off. An investigator testified that roughly 444 miles of the vehicle's travel that day couldn't be fully accounted for. Yet during cross-examination, the defense questioned the police work and some of the data. After the prosecution spent weeks on their case, the defense rested after just calling a few witnesses over the course of a single day. Perhaps they believed there was enough reasonable doubt.

4:22The jury disagreed, finding Larry responsible for Maya's death. Larry will be sentenced at a later date and could appeal. This has been a special verdict episode of Case by Case. We'll be back next week with a brand new episode. Thanks for listening.