The younger brother of a missing Chula Vista woman testified Friday that during the year leading up to his sister's disappearance, his brother-in-law repeatedly urged him to convince his sister to remain in the marriage.
“She didn’t want anything to do with him anymore,” testified Jay-R Tabalanza.
He went on to say that in 2020, Larry Millete began calling him on an almost daily basis for help regarding his deteriorating marriage with May "Maya" Millete.
Larry Millete, 41, is charged with murdering his wife, who has not been seen since Jan. 7, 2021. Prosecutors allege Millete killed her because she sought a divorce. In a local news broadcast and a court declaration in a separate court case, Millete stated that he believed his wife left their home voluntarily.
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Friday's testimony was part of a multi-week court proceeding in which a judge will decide if there is enough evidence for Millete to stand trial for murder.
Tabalanza testified that starting in early 2020, he began receiving routine phone calls from Larry, in which Millete stated that he feared May was going to leave him.
Tabalanza testified that Larry would call "to see what I could do with Maya ... basically try to convince her to not leave him."
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Tabalanza said that, on some days, Larry would call him four or five times and would be concerned when Tabalanza did not pick up. One of Maya's sisters, Maricris Drouaillet, previously testified that, in 2020, Larry would also call her and other family members for marital advice.
In the middle of 2020, Maya moved in with Tabalanza and his wife for about six weeks. Tabalanza testified that Maya said she wanted to separate from her husband and "co-parent" their three children.
During a New Year's family trip in Glamis, Maya revealed to several family members, including Drouaillet, that she was planning to divorce Larry soon.
"Be ready. It's going to be a messy divorce," Drouaillet testified Thursday, quoting her sister. "If something happens to me, it's going to be Larry."
Over the last two days, Drouaillet and Tabalanza have both testified that Larry was increasingly controlling over Maya. On a sibling trip to Lakewood, Tabalanza testified that Larry called Maya every time he stopped driving.
“It’s almost like she was being tracked,” said Tabalanza.
And in the months leading up to her disappearance, Tabalanza said the couple’s fights got increasingly ugly.
“I received a phone call from Larry and he sounded in a panic saying that to come over and help calm my sister down because she had threatened to call police on him.
But for all his concerns about Maya’s whereabouts, Drouaillet and Tabalanza both testified that, after Maya disappeared on Jan. 7, 2021, Larry did not appear worried about his wife's absence. She testified that, as far as she knew, Larry never assisted the family or conducted his own efforts to search for May or spread the word regarding her disappearance.
Prosecutors have alleged that Millete's efforts to keep his wife in the marriage included employing the services of spell casters, through whom he hoped magic could be used to convince his wife to stay. Later, he allegedly asked the spell casters to render her incapacitated so she could not leave the home. His messages to spell casters abruptly halted after Jan. 8, save for one message on Jan. 9 that requested that hexes on his wife be removed, according to an arrest warrant declaration.
The Maya Millete Case: This is an entry in NBC 7's live blog coverage of the Larry Millete Hearing. To read other entries, CLICK HERE
