LOS ANGELES (AP) \u2014 Seven months after a 14-year-old girl\u2019s body was found in D4vd\u2019s towed SUV, the alt-pop singer has been arrested on suspicion of killing her, authorities said.<\/p>\n
Detectives arrested the 21-year-old, whose legal name is David Burke, on Thursday on suspicion of murder in the investigation of the killing of Celeste Rivas Hernandez, Los Angeles police said. Authorities had not publicly named Burke as a suspect until his arrest. Investigators are expected to present a case to prosecutors on Monday, police said. Burke\u2019s lawyers have declared his innocence.<\/p>\n
Here are a few things to know about the case:<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSinger was arrested, but is not currently charged<\/p>\n
The Los Angeles County District Attorney\u2019s Office said in a statement that it is aware of the arrest and its Major Crimes Division will review the case to determine whether there is enough evidence to file charges.<\/p>\n
Defense attorneys Blair Berk, Marilyn Bednarski and Regina Peter stressed that Burke has only been detained under suspicion, no indictment had been returned and no criminal complaint has been filed.<\/p>\n
\u201cLet us be clear \u2014 the actual evidence in this case will show that David Burke did not murder Celeste Rivas Hernandez and he was not the cause of her death,\u201d the defense lawyers said. \u201cWe will vigorously defend David\u2019s innocence.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCeleste Rivas Hernandez was reported missing at age 13<\/p>\n
The seventh grader\u2019s family reported her missing in 2024 from her hometown of Lake Elsinore, about 70 miles (112 kilometers) southeast of Los Angeles. Her long-dead body was found in an apparently abandoned Tesla Model Y towed from an upscale Hollywood Hills neighborhood on Sept. 8, a day after she would have turned 15. Authorities give her age as 14 when she was killed in court documents.<\/p>\n
Police investigators searching the Tesla in a tow yard found a cadaver bag \u201ccovered with insects and a strong odor of decay,\u201d court documents said, and \u201cdetectives partially unzipped the bag and observed a decomposed head and torso.\u201d Los Angeles County Medical Examiner\u2019s Office investigators \u201cdiscovered the arms and legs had been severed from the body,\u201d according to court documents. Dismembered body parts were found inside a second black bag beneath the first. No cause of death has been publicly revealed.<\/p>\n
Police in November had blocked the coroner\u2019s office from publicly releasing the autopsy\u2019s findings.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSinger popular with Gen Z for indie rock, R&B and lo-fi pop blend<\/p>\n
D4vd, pronounced \u201cDavid,\u201d went viral on TikTok in 2022 with the hit \u201cRomantic Homicide,\u201d which peaked at No. 4 on Billboard\u2019s Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart. After signing with Darkroom and Interscope Records D4vd released his debut EP \u201cPetals to Thorns\u201d and a follow-up, \u201cThe Lost Petals,\u201d in 2023.<\/p>\n
He was on tour supporting his first full-length album, \u201cWithered,\u201d when Rivas Hernandez\u2019s body was found. The last two North American shows, in San Francisco and Los Angeles, along with a scheduled performance at LA\u2019s Grammy Museum, were canceled, as was the European tour that was to have begun in Norway.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSecret grand jury investigation revealed after singer\u2019s family objects to testifying<\/p>\n
The singer had been under investigation by an Los Angeles County grand jury looking into the death of Rivas Hernandez. The probe’s existence \u2014 and the designation of D4vd as its target \u2014 was revealed when his mother, father and brother filed an objection in a Texas court to subpoenas demanding they testify. The Associated Press obtained documents in the case in February that had been sealed in California, where the grand jury investigation had been kept secret. The 2023 Tesla Model Y was registered in the singer\u2019s name at the Texas address of his subpoenaed family members, according to court filings from prosecutors. <\/p>\n
The status of the grand jury investigation wasn\u2019t immediately clear but Burke\u2019s attorneys noted no indictment has been returned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LOS ANGELES (AP) \u2014 Seven months after a 14-year-old girl\u2019s body was found in D4vd\u2019s towed SUV, the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":272853,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[29795,27902,5167,48,52,51,47,50,49],"class_list":{"0":"post-272852","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-ap-entertainment","9":"tag-ap-u-s-news","10":"tag-associated-press","11":"tag-la","12":"tag-la-headlines","13":"tag-la-news","14":"tag-los-angeles","15":"tag-los-angeles-headlines","16":"tag-los-angeles-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272852","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=272852"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272852\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/272853"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=272852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=272852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=272852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}