by In a court petition, Larry Millete’s lawyers contended that a trial in Chula Vista would deny him a fair trial due to the widespread exposure and news coverage surrounding him.
The trial for the Chula Vista man accused of killing his wife, Maya Millete, who vanished from her home more than four years ago, is scheduled for January.
The media coverage of her abduction and his criminal prosecution has clearly impacted public opinion, according to Millete’s attorneys, who hinted last month that they would want his case tried outside of the South Bay. Additionally, there is an unjustified and substantial risk of juror bias.
Impaneling unbiased jurors in Chula Vista would be particularly challenging, according to attorneys Liann Sabatini and Colby Ryan, because the population that would be selected for a prospective jury pool is too small to mitigate negative publicity.
The defense team for Millete is requesting a change of venue, requesting that the trial be moved to either Vista or El Cajon. Next week, there will be a hearing on the motion.
The motion states: “It is clear that there is a serious risk that prospective jurors in South Bay would, and have already, evaluated Mr. Millete based on what the media has widely and infrequently accurately described about his lifestyle and personality, rather than on his demonstrated actions or anything based on the actual evidence in this case.”
The defense motion explicitly cites a news conference that was held shortly after Millete’s arrest in October 2021 by the San Diego County District Attorney’s Office and Chula Vista police.
In order to persuade the public that Millete was guilty, the defense claims that many of the evidence presented by District Attorney Summer Stephan during the press conference was false, misleading, and designed to show Millete killed his wife.
References to home security footage that captured a string of jagged sounds in the Millete family’s neighborhood the night May Millete vanished were included in those comments.
Since January 7, 2021, she has not been seen or heard from.
According to Stephan, the tape quality prevented the FBI from determining whether those sounds were gunshots. The implication that the noises were gunshots, according to Millete’s lawyers, has tainted prospective jurors and was an attempt to introduce evidence that might not have been admitted as proof of Mr. Millete’s guilt. It will be hard for jurors to forget and will surely skew and affect their opinions of the case’s facts before they even enter the courtroom for the trial.
According to another statement, Millete allegedly sent a number of messages to spellcasters in an attempt to persuade his wife to abandon her divorce intentions. According to Stephan, some of the texts advised rendering her incapable of leaving the house and relying on Millete by having her have an accident or break a bone.
The defense contended that none of the communications contained a request to murder May, which was not revealed during the press conference, despite Stephan’s claim that the messages showed Millete’s homicidal thoughts to hurt Mrs. Millete.
Additionally, Stephan pointed out that she had never dealt with spell casting in any case during her career. The defense claimed that this was done to make the case more sensational so that the South Bay community would be unable to forget or not be biased against Mr. Millete.
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They contend that mentions of spell casting in news reports about the case have sparked prejudice against Mr. Millete, particularly among prospective jurors who practice religions that forbid witchcraft or spell casting, and that this will ultimately keep Mr. Millete from getting a fair trial in the South Bay.
Potential elements of Millete’s defense strategy are also hinted at in the defense file, such as the purported absence of evidence linking a murder that occurred within the Millete residence. According to the motion, the inquiry found no evidence of gunshots in the house, no evidence of May Millete’s blood in the house or in Millete’s car, and cadaver dogs that were brought into the house and Millete’s car found nothing.
According to the complaint, May Millete had previously banned Mr. Millete, blocked her whereabouts, and left Mr. Millete and his kids at home without telling them where she was going. However, she returned home a few days later.
Millete, 43, is still detained without being granted bail. If found guilty of murder, he may spend 25 years to life in state prison. Additionally, he faces a felony charge of assault weapon possession.
