The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office is predicted to announce Monday whether or not it would file legal charges towards alt-pop artist d4vd in reference to the killing of 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez.
The 21-year-old singer, whose authorized title is David Anthony Burke, was arrested Thursday, seven months after the younger lady’s decomposed physique was found in his apparently deserted Tesla. Her physique was found greater than a 12 months after she was reported lacking in Southern California.
Prosecutors stated the case is being reviewed by the workplace’s Major Crimes Division, which is tasked with figuring out whether or not the recognized details and accessible proof meet the brink for legal charges.
“At this time, additional information is not available,” the district lawyer’s workplace informed NCS in a assertion Friday. “We will share an update on Monday once a filing decision has been made.”
Rivas’ household, who’ve largely stayed out of public view since her physique was found, plan to attend Monday’s information convention, in accordance to their lawyer.
“The Rivas Hernandez family is committed to ensuring that Celeste’s voice is heard and her memory is honored throughout this process,” Patrick Steinfeld, the lawyer for the household, stated.
Meanwhile, d4vd’s attorneys stated they intend to “vigorously defend David’s innocence,” including that the singer “has only been detained under suspicion.”
“Let us be clear – 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,” attorneys Blair Berk, Marilyn Bednarski and Regina Peter stated in a assertion.
“There has been no indictment returned by any grand jury in this case and no criminal complaint filed,” the assertion stated.
Court paperwork launched in February point out a grand jury has been investigating the singer in reference to Rivas’ loss of life. The filings don’t element what position authorities suspect he could have performed in her loss of life, however establish him as a “target” of the probe who could have been “involved.”
Monday comes almost two years after the third – and ultimate – time Rivas was reported lacking by her household, capping a collection of pressing pleas in early 2024 as family members and mates grew more and more alarmed concerning the seventh grader’s security and whereabouts.
She was solely 13 years previous on the time – a teenager remembered in photographs for her tender smile and thick, curly hair.
In September 2025, a day after what would have been her fifteenth birthday, her dismembered and decomposed physique was found in the trunk of a Tesla registered to d4vd whereas he was in Minneapolis on a world tour selling his debut album, “Withered.”
Authorities haven’t established a clear timeline for when Rivas was killed, although court docket data point out she was 14 on the time of her loss of life. Photographs obtained by NCS counsel she was alive virtually a 12 months after she was first reported lacking.
Neighbors say the automobile appeared deserted, parked on a avenue not removed from the Hollywood Hills residence the place d4vd had been dwelling. It was later towed, and an worker on the yard alerted police after noticing a robust, foul odor coming from the automobile.
Authorities arrested the singer on April 16 on suspicion of killing Rivas, taking him into custody at a residence in the Hollywood Hills simply over a mile from the tow yard the place the younger lady’s physique was found inside his automobile.
He is being held in jail with out bail.
Clues level to connection between Rivas and d4vd
Clues pointing to a connection between Rivas and d4vd surfaced even earlier than she was reported lacking. In January 2024, the 2 appeared collectively in a livestream on Twitch, joking and speaking into the early morning hours earlier than d4vd, laughing, stated: “Delete everything.”
Sometime between January and March 2024, the singer was photographed stepping out of a black Tesla simply blocks from Rivas’ residence. A neighborhood teenager later posted the photographs to TikTok. NCS geolocated and chronolocated the photographs to confirm when and the place they have been taken.
In June 2024, Rivas was photographed backstage at a sold-out present d4vd carried out at The Fonda Theatre in Los Angeles. A personal investigator later uncovered further photographs showing to present the 2 collectively in late December 2024 and early January 2025.
NCS’s Elizabeth Wolfe, Thomas Bordeaux, Allison Gordon and Kyung Lah contributed to this report.