CHULA VISTA, Calif. (KGTV) — NOTE: This page will be updated throughout the day.
4:45 p.m. — Two of Maya Millete's friends and coworkers took the stand in the afternoon.
Maria Mariscal testified that she and Maya met approximately 15 years ago. Mariscal said she noticed in 2020 that Maya wasn't wearing her wedding ring and was primarily posting pictures that did not include Larry.
Mariscal testified to going out to lunch with Maya on several occasions where Larry would call on FaceTime. She said Maya would have to turn the camera to show Larry who she was with. She said Maya opened up about her marriage troubles in April of 2020.
During cross-examination, Mariscal said Maya never told her she was having an affair. Mariscal said she was aware of the allegations but never knew the information was true.
Kristeen Timmers also took the stand. She testified to meeting Maya in 2008 when the two were interns at Balboa Naval Hospital.
Timmers said Maya and their friend group often communicated via text or Facebook Messenger, but eventually they started jumping around on different platforms because Maya told them Larry was accessing her accounts and viewing, deleting, or reading her conversations.
She said she learned in February or March of 2020 that Maya and Larry were having marital problems. She said she remembered hearing about the affair allegations.
Timmers said Larry once sent her messages from Maya's account asking her to help him keep the family together, rather than apart.
Timmers also testified that she once returned a missed call from Maya, who sounded shaky and frustrated after an argument with Larry.
She said Maya was yelling through a door, “I need a minute,” and told her she wanted space, but Larry would not leave her alone. Timmers testified she could hear banging, knocking, and the children trying to get in.
Later that night, Maya sent Timmers a photo showing a hole in a wall and said Larry had forcibly opened the door. Prosecutors showed the image to jurors. Timmers said Maya also briefly posted the photo to her social media story before taking it down.
Later in her testimony, she said Maya once told her she was afraid that Larry would hurt their children to hurt Maya. Timmers said she never asked Maya about that statement again.
12:15 p.m. — The defense continued its cross-examination of the spellcaster Frank Peavey.
Peavey testified that Larry often apologized for being a burden and said he initially viewed him as “a very sweet person.” The defense presented messages showing Peavey offering reassurance and encouraging Larry to contact him outside the Fiverr platform, providing his personal email address.
Peavey said some of those messages were intended to placate Larry and move communications away from Fiverr so he could avoid possibly getting negative reviews from Larry.
He testified that he had grown frustrated with Larry’s repeated questions and acknowledged that, in hindsight, he should have been more direct.
“In retrospect, I should have been more direct,” Peavey said.
Under questioning by the defense, Peavey confirmed that Larry never asked him to make his wife disappear and never requested that she be killed.
10:45 a.m. — During cross-examination, defense attorney Colby Ryan read a few of the titles of the spells that were offered, including a “love obsession spell” and “cause your ex to fall back in love with you.”
Peavey testified that with Larry, he wanted everything fast and immediate, calling some of his requests “crazy.” Peavey agreed with Ryan that Larry wanted to bring Maya back to him and never wanted to banish her. He said that any requests for banishment were for Maya’s affair partner, Jamey Laird.
10:15 a.m. — For the first time, one of the spellcasters that Larry Millete hired took the stand for Day 15 of his murder trial.
On Wednesday, Frank Peavey said he classified his work as “spiritual assistance” rather than spellcasting, saying he found it “very rewarding and very peaceful.” He has been in the field since 2011 and said people often contact him when they are in difficult situations.
Peavey said that in late 2020, Larry contacted him, stating that “his relationship with his wife was wonderful, and at some point, it became a struggle.” Peavey said that Larry wanted to rekindle the marriage. The two communicated on a platform called Fiverr, which is a website that connects people with freelance professionals offering a variety of services.
“He sent a lot of messages at first. It was a lot to take it,” Peavey said. “I would check and there would be 27 messages.”
Peavey testified that a lot of the messages were choppy, but that Larry wanted “full attention and immediate responses.”
“It would describe him as desperate and obsessive,” Peavey said. “I learned pretty quickly that this gentleman was so manic and desperate and so off the wall and obsessive.”
Peavey said he eventually blocked Larry, saying it’s not something that he did often. “I’d had enough,” he testified.
During testimony, Larry stared straight ahead, as he had been doing throughout the trial. He is accused of murdering his wife, Maya, in 2021. Her body has never been found.
