Peter Van Sant

It's really haunting.

A very powerful moment.

So this is what's called a no body case, which could make it more difficult to prosecute.

The defense has leaned on that from the very beginning, arguing that there's no evidence a murder even occurred.

And the thing about no body cases is sometimes even without a body, there can be a clear indication of a killing.

I covered the case of a famous dog trainer named Mark Stover in the Pacific Northwest.

He was missing, but there was evidence he must have been shot in his home.

There was blood and bullet shell casings and a wounded dog.

There was little doubt someone had been shot there.

There doesn't seem to be that level of evidence here, though, and that could be a problem for the prosecution.

Katrina, let's get into what happened during the trial this week.

What were some of the major moments?

This actually came up in the original 48 Hours episode that aired in 2022.

Attorney and former criminal defense investigator for the U.S.

Navy, Billy Little, took it upon himself to investigate the case after finding out about Maya's disappearance.

Here is correspondent Jonathan Vigliotti from that 48 Hours episode.

And that was something that Billy Little talked about as well to 48 Hours in the same episode, saying it was 10.30 p.m., the night Maya was last heard from.

According to Little, it was a cooler night and pretty late for kids to be outside.

The sights and sounds of this evidence must have intrigued those jurors.

How does the defense attempt to minimize its impact?