Singer D4vd accused of stabbing 14-year-old girl to death to silence her

Warning: graphic content

Los Angeles: Prosecutors said on Wednesday that singer D4vd killed 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez by stabbing her multiple times then dismembered her body using chainsaws in his garage.

The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office shared what it said the evidence in the case would show in a court filing that provided the first detailed allegations of the killing and efforts to dismember Celeste’s body and get rid of evidence.

The court filing said D4vd, whose legal name is David Burke, met Celeste when she was 11, and began sexually abusing her when she was 13 and he was 18. Burke is accused of killing Celeste when she threatened to reveal the abuse.

“Knowing he had to silence the victim before she ruined his music career as she had threatened, very soon after her arrival at his home, [the] defendant stabbed the victim to death multiple times and stood by while she bled out,” the filing said.

Burke has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder and other counts. His lawyers have said he is innocent and did not cause Celeste’s death.

Her body was found decomposing in a Tesla towed from the Hollywood Hills in September.

Prosecutors obtained text messages between the two from April 22, 2025, the night before all her phone activity went quiet and they believe she was killed. They also obtained text messages that showed their sexual relationship, including child sexual abuse images of her on his phone.

“The messages reveal the victim’s jealousy over defendant’s relationships with other women, as [the] defendant led her to believe they had a future together,” the document says. “She became extremely upset and threatened to disclose damaging information about her relationship with [the] defendant to end his career and destroy his life.”

The court filing is intended to outline the evidence that prosecutors plan to present at a preliminary evidentiary hearing beginning on May 26, when a judge will determine whether there is probable cause to go to trial. The defence has not publicly provided its version of events.

The document says Burke bought two chainsaws online that he used to cut apart Celeste’s body in an inflatable pool in his garage, where the girl’s DNA was later found.

“Defendant took horrifying measures to destroy and discard the victim’s body,” prosecutors said in the brief.

Burke then drove to Lake Cachuma in Santa Barbara County, about 180 kilometres north-west of his home, to get rid of evidence, the document alleges. Her passport was found there in January. Burke returned home by April 24 last year, when he gave a radio interview promoting his debut full-length album, Withered, which was released the following day, prosecutors said in the filing.

Celeste’s body had so degraded that examiners couldn’t even determine her eye colour. She had braces at the time of her death, and a tattoo that read “Shhh….” on the inside of a finger as well as his name, according to the report. Two fingers were missing, as were parts of her arms and legs.

Prosecutors had not previously described how they believed the teenager was killed or her relationship with Burke. An autopsy report said she was killed by penetrating wounds.

Prosecutors said Celeste’s parents reported her missing from her home in Lake Elsinore, about 130 kilometres outside Los Angeles, in February 2024. After that report, Riverside County Sheriff’s detectives contacted Burke, but he told them he had only met her once and did not know she was a minor.

After Celeste returned home in February last year, her parents took away her cellphone, but Burke is alleged to have driven to her home town and paid a friend of the girl $1000 to give her a phone so they could communicate.

Celeste was reported missing again in April 2024. The court document said that year, she spent much of her time at Burke’s home in the Hollywood Hills and travelled with him to Las Vegas, London and Texas to meet his family.

The defence attorneys asked Superior Court Judge Charlaine F. Olmedo at a hearing on Wednesday to seal the document, but she declined. They had no comment outside court.

Burke was arrested on April 16 and pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder, lewd and lascivious acts with a person under 14, and mutilating a dead body. He is eligible for the death penalty if found guilty, but prosecutors said they had not decided whether to seek it.

The singer began making music for YouTube videos he created of the video game Fortnite when he was a teenager.

The songs he wrote and recorded on his phone were a blend of indie rock, R&B and lo-fi pop. The music made him a phenomenon on TikTok, Instagram, SoundCloud and Spotify, where his top songs, including his 2022 breakthrough Romantic Homicide, have more than a billion plays. In 2023, he released two EPs and opened for SZA on tour.

He performed at last year’s Coachella music festival just a few weeks before prosecutors said Celeste was killed and his album was released. He was on tour promoting it in September when the girl’s body was discovered and his name became publicly attached to the case. It was seven months before he was arrested.

AP

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