LOS ANGELES (AP) — Alt-pop singer D4vd has been charged with sexually abusing, murdering and mutilating the body of 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez, whose decomposed remains were found in his apparently abandoned Tesla seven months ago, Los Angeles County prosecutors say.
The charges were filed Monday, but the allegations in the disturbing case stretch back to 2023 — just a year after the singer's first single made it onto the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The 21-year-old's defense attorney pleaded not guilty on his behalf during an arraignment Monday afternoon.
Here's a look at the timeline of the investigation, the allegations and the career of D4vd, whose legal name is David Burke.
Burke, a content creator who began making his own music to accompany the video game montages he would post online, goes viral on TikTok for his song “Romantic Homicide.” The song ultimately peaks at No. 4 on Billboard's Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart, and Burke signs with Darkroom and Interscope Records.
Burke allegedly begins the continuous sexual abuse of Rivas Hernandez, who had just turned 13, according to the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office. The girl has been described by authorities as a runaway, and court documents say she lived with Burke in Los Angeles.
Rivas Hernandez's family reports the seventh grader missing from her home in Lake Elsinore, a town about 70 miles (112 kilometers) southeast of Los Angeles, for the last time. They had reported her missing several times before.
Burke performs at the music festival Coachella and goes viral again — this time for face-planting hard on the stage during a failed backflip attempt. In an interview with The Associated Press during the festival, Burke talked about using social media feedback from fans to refine his set lists. “I am my fans and my fans are me. And we work in tandem with each other and it's such a beautiful poetic kind of thing that we have,” he said.
The charging documents filed by prosecutors in the case against Burke have few details, but they do allege he killed Rivas Hernandez “on or about” April 23, the day they say she was last heard from. Prosecutors say Burke killed Rivas Hernandez because she posed a threat to his career.
Burke releases his first album, “Withered.” In social media posts and media interviews, he describes using a recurring motif in his music and videos — an alter ego character he calls “IT4MI,” after “itami,” a Japanese word for pain. “He's basically like the evil version of me," Burke said in a YouTube interview with the “Tape Notes” podcast published May 2025. Burke's videos sometimes depict the character blindfolded, in a shirt that appears covered in blood.
One of the felony charges against Burke is “unlawful mutilation of human remains." Prosecutors say Rivas Hernandez's arms and legs were severed from her body on or around May 5.
Burke's tour for the album “Withered,” begins with a show in Del Mar, California. He also released an official Fortnite anthem, “Locked & Loaded,” on Sept. 3. The collaboration with video game creator Epic Games echoed his start in the music world, when he would create and post Fortnite montages online.
One day after she would have turned 15, Rivas Hernandez's badly decomposed remains are discovered in body bags inside the trunk of a Tesla registered to Burke, prosecutors say. The 2023 Tesla Model Y had been towed from an upscale neighborhood in the Hollywood Hills where it had been sitting, seemingly abandoned. Police searching the vehicle found a cadaver bag covered in bugs with Rivas Hernandez's head and torso inside. A second bag containing her arms and legs was found underneath the first, according to court documents.
The remaining dates of Burke's tour, which had been scheduled to wrap up Nov. 4 in Warsaw, Poland, are canceled. The Associated Press confirmed that D4vd was also dropped by his label, Interscope Records, at some point in 2025.
Multiple news outlets reported that Rivas Hernandez's family held a funeral service for her on at the Queen of Heaven Cemetery and Mortuary in Rowland Heights, California.
In an unusual move, police block the release of the coroner's report on Rivas Hernandez's death. The medical examiner's office said in a statement that it had received a “court order, initiated by the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), to place a security hold” on the case. The order said no records or details, including the cause and manner of death, could be released until further notice.
The grand jury investigation into the case was kept under seal, as is standard in grand jury proceedings. But some documents were made public by an appeal of subpoenas by Burke's mother, father and brother that was filed in Texas. The court filings said the Tesla was registered in Burke's name at the address of his subpoenaed family members, and that the “target may be involved in having committed the following criminal offenses against the laws of the State of California, to wit: One count of murder.”
Burke is arrested on suspicion of murder in connection with Rivas Hernandez's death and is held without bail. The Los Angeles Police Department announces the arrest on social media pages, posting photos of several officers wearing tactical gear and holding weapons approaching a home.
Burke is formally charged with murder, lewd and lascivious acts with a person under 14 and mutilating a body. The charging documents also allege several factors connected to the crimes that could lead to a harsher sentence if Burke is convicted. Those circumstances include allegations that Burke was “lying in wait” for Rivas Hernandez, who entered his home and was never seen again; that she was a witness to an investigation into the lewd and lascivious acts committed against her; and that Burke allegedly killed her for financial gain.
“When she threatened to expose his criminal conduct and devastate his musical career, Burke allegedly murdered her,” the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office wrote in a statement.
Boone reported from Boise. AP Music Writer Maria Sherman and journalist Liam McEwan contributed.
Singer-songwriter, David Burke aka D4vd sits in artist space at Coachella music festival on April 18, 2025 in Indio, Calif. (AP Photo)
A photo of Celeste Rivas Hernandez is displayed Monday, April 20, 2026, in Los Angeles for a press conference regarding the case of singer D4vd, who was arrested on suspicion of killing the 14-year-old girl whose dismembered body was found in his car. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
A mugshot of David Anthony Burke, whose stage name is D4vd, is displayed Monday, April 20, 2026, in Los Angeles at a press conference regarding the case of D4vd, who was arrested on suspicion of killing a 14-year-old girl whose dismembered body was found in his car. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
