* Singer accused of fatally stabbing and dismembering victim’s body
* Prosecutors accuse her of threatening to expose inappropriate relationship
*The body of a 14-year-old girl was found in the trunk of a car last September
Steve Gorman
LOS ANGELES – Indie pop star D4vd will appear in court on Tuesday, where prosecutors are expected to outline the murder case against the musician, who is accused of stabbing and dismembering his teenage girlfriend after she threatened to go public with their relationship.
The singer-songwriter, whose stage name is D4vd but whose legal name is listed in court records as David Burke, was arrested in April and charged with first-degree murder, mutilation of human remains and child sexual abuse.
The preliminary hearing, which could last several days, requires the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office to prove to a judge there is enough evidence to proceed with the case. Burke rose to fame in 2022 as a teenager after a song he recorded on his phone for a Fortnite-branded gaming video went viral on TikTok, and the hit single “Romantic Killing” helped him sign a deal with Interscope Records.
He performed at the Coachella Valley music festival in California last year, less than two weeks after prosecutors said he committed murder out of fear that his underage girlfriend would upend his budding career.
Burke, now 21, is accused of killing and hiding the body of 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez, who disappeared in April 2025. Five months later, her badly decomposed body was found in the trunk of an abandoned car owned by the singer.
He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
“We believe the actual evidence will show that David Burke did not murder Celeste Rivas Hernandez and was not the cause of her death,” defense attorney Blair Berk said during his client’s arraignment on April 20. Prosecutors filed a court brief the following week outlining their evidence and their alleged motive for killing the girl, which the District Attorney’s Office said may have been on April 23, 2025. day, when all her cellular activity ceased.
Prosecutors said Burke was trying to silence the girl because she became increasingly jealous of him and threatened to destroy his burgeoning music career by publishing damaging information about their relationship.
Burke, whose first studio album is due to be released this week, has received highly lucrative product endorsements, the district attorney’s office said.
In a special charge included in the indictment against Burke, Burke was charged with murder for financial gain. Another claimed he did so because the victim was a witness to the crime.
‘terrible measures’
According to prosecutors, Burke began a sexual relationship with the girl when she was 11 years old, and investigators found text messages about sex, pregnancy, abortion and Plan B emergency contraception, as well as sexually explicit photos. One day after they argued over her threats to expose him, Burke hailed her for an Uber ride to his Hollywood Hills home and then stabbed the victim to death when she arrived, according to court briefs. An autopsy found she died of “multiple penetrating injuries.” In their brief, prosecutors also detailed allegations of the “horrible steps” Burke took to dismember and dispose of the girl’s body.
According to the documents, the performer placed the victim’s body in a blue inflatable pool “to prevent blood from splattering on the garage floor” and then removed her limbs with a chain saw and “perhaps other tools.” The brief states that Burke purchased the swimming pool, two chain saws, a shovel, a body bag and other materials online under a false name and had the items delivered to his home after the killing. The victim’s torso and head were eventually found in a body bag packed in the trunk of a Tesla registered to Burke, according to police, prosecutors and the medical examiner. Underneath was a plastic trash bag containing the victim’s limbs, they said.
Two fingers on the girl’s left hand, one of which bore Burke’s name, were amputated but have not been restored, prosecutors said.
According to court briefs, Burke was the last person to drive the vehicle on July 29, 2025, before abandoning it near his home and leaving for a concert tour. Weeks later, the car was towed to an impound lot, where workers reported a putrid smell, which was reported to authorities on September 8.
A search of Burke’s garage that month turned up evidence of dismemberment, including blood samples and remnants of an inflatable pool with “multiple linear incisions,” according to prosecutors.
This article was generated from automated news agency feeds without modifications to the text.
