Murder suspect d4vd’s preliminary hearing underway as prosecutors detail 14-year-old girl’s death
d4vd Preliminary Hearing: Murder Suspect’s Case Details Emerge
Earthguardiansonline.com – The preliminary hearing for murder suspect d4vd s preliminary case has begun in Los Angeles, with prosecutors outlining the circumstances surrounding 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez’s death. Legal proceedings opened Tuesday and will likely continue over several days as a judge reviews whether enough evidence supports moving to trial.
Murder suspect d4vd s preliminary hearing centers on multiple charges against the musician, whose real name is David Anthony Burke. He pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder with special circumstances, continuous sexual abuse of a child under 14, and mutilation of human remains. These charges connect to Celeste Rivas Hernandez, whose badly decomposed remains were found inside the singer’s abandoned car roughly ten months prior.
How the Relationship Developed
Prosecution records show that d4vd and Celeste first met in 2022 when she was 11. Their connection deepened over time, and prosecutors claim a sexual relationship started in November 2023. At that moment, d4vd was 18 and Celeste was 13 years old.
Interestingly, November 2023 also marked d4vd’s appearance on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” where he performed “Romantic Homicide,” his breakthrough song. Celeste was still living at that time, though nobody knew what would happen to her.
Tracking Celeste’s Movements
A CNN investigation found that Celeste showed up repeatedly in d4vd’s circle both before and after her first missing report in February 2024. Camera footage from January 2024 captured her on a Twitch livestream with the musician. They chatted and joked until about 3 a.m., when d4vd reportedly said, “Delete everything.”
“Delete everything.”
Photos between January and March 2024 showed d4vd leaving a black Tesla near Celeste’s Lake Elsinore, California home. A local teen posted these pictures on TikTok. CNN used geolocation and chronolocation methods to verify when and where the photos were taken.
Celeste was reported missing three times in early 2024. Her first disappearance was recorded in mid-February 2024 when she was 13, with flyers noting she was last seen around February 14. Soon after, someone worried about Celeste emailed an address linked to d4vd’s record label. The email mentioned rumors about d4vd and Celeste and asked him to “take her home” if those rumors were true.
What Prosecutors Are Presenting
Though the exact date of Celeste’s death is unclear, photos suggest she lived nearly a year after her first missing report. Court papers show authorities think she was 14 when she died. More evidence appeared in June 2024 when Celeste was photographed backstage at d4vd’s sold-out show at The Fonda Theatre in Los Angeles.
After Celeste’s body was identified in September 2025, a private investigator for property owner Steve Fischer found a digital camera inside d4vd’s rental home. The camera held pictures of both Celeste and d4vd from late December 2024 and early January 2025. Around that same time, d4vd posted images from the camera on his X account with the words “took these pics,” along with a selfie showing him wearing the same camera model.
Prosecutors say a major fight happened between d4vd and Celeste after the teenager got upset about the musician dating other women. Text messages from that night show Celeste “threatened to disclose damaging information about her relationship” with d4vd, who was 20 at the time. The messages suggested she thought revealing this would “end his career and destroy his life.” Prosecutors believe this argument marks the day Celeste was killed, with d4vd cutting up her body afterward to keep their relationship secret.
The murder suspect d4vd s preliminary hearing continues as the court decides whether the evidence justifies proceeding with criminal charges against the 21-year-old singer.
