The Chula Vista man sentenced to 25 years for murdering his wife, who vanished more than five years ago, continues to claim his innocence from behind bars.

Larry Millete, a Navy optician, was found guilty of first-degree murder in July. Security camera footage showed his wife, Maya, entering the family’s Chula Vista home in 2021, but never leaving.

In his latest interview after the sentencing was announced on Nov. 2, he insisted that he didn’t kill Maya and she may be in hiding or missing.

“I’ve seen stuff in the newspaper and on the news that people show up after 20 years. It’s not that difficult to stay hidden, even here in the United States,” Millete told Fox 5 in an exclusive interview from the detention facility where he has been held for the last five years.

When Fox 5’s reporter, Zara Barker, asked him about Maya’s body, he shrugged his shoulders and said, “I don’t know… because I am not the one responsible for her disappearance.”

Throughout the interview, he maintained a calm persona similar to his conduct during the trial, which he said has led people to call him “emotionless.”

“I do still love Maya. I miss her every day. She wasn’t just my spouse or my wife; she was my best friend, my best, best friend. So for them to say that I’ve harmed my best friend and disposed of her body like trash is very offensive,” Millete told Fox 5.

Though Maya’s phone went cold on January 8, Larry insisted the house was far from silent, claiming he and their young son, Lazarus, felt her presence that evening.

“They keep saying January 7th, but my children and I heard, possibly heard, cause physically we saw her, physically on the seventh, but on the eighth, when I came back with Lazarus, when we were going to bed,” he told the news outlet.

He went on to say that the discovery of his wife having an affair with another man was more shocking to him than her disappearance.

“A lot of it is mostly embarrassing. The shocking part is finding out what she was really doing… It’s gut-wrenching,” Millete told the news outlet.

He said he wishes he was more concerned about his wife’s disappearance than the embarrassment that he thought her affair would cause him. “I should have done things a little different,” he said.

The jury reviewed evidence that revealed domestic abuse, infidelity, and a campaign of fear against the mother of three, who was last seen in 2021 and has never been found.

Millete was sentenced on Nov. 2, 2026, to 25 years to life, and he is now awaiting a transfer to a state prison. He was also given a consecutive two-year term for an associated weapons charge.

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