A Los Angeles courtroom opened its doors Tuesday for the preliminary hearing of David Anthony Burke, the TikTok-famous singer who performs as D4vd, accused of stabbing a 13-year-old girl to death, dismembering her body with a chainsaw, and leaving her remains in an impounded Tesla where they sat for months until a tow yard manager noticed the smell. Prosecutors say he did it to keep her quiet about what he was doing to her. Burke was 18. She was 13.
What prosecutors say happened, in brutal detail
According to court documents reviewed by The Guardian, Burke and Celeste Rivas Hernandez began a sexual relationship in November 2023. He was 18. She was 13 years old. Los Angeles county prosecutors allege that by April of last year, Burke decided she had become a liability as his music career was taking off, and he stabbed her to death inside his Los Angeles residence.
Then, according to prosecutors, it got worse. Burke allegedly used a chainsaw to saw off her limbs and amputated her ring finger, which bore a tattoo of his name, before loading her dismembered remains into a Tesla. The car was eventually impounded at a Hollywood tow yard, where it sat until September 2025, when the yard manager noticed an overwhelming odor and called police. That call is what blew the case open.
The preliminary hearing, which is expected to wrap by Thursday, exists to determine whether prosecutors have enough evidence to send Burke to trial. Given what they say they have, that bar may not be a high one. The Guardian reports the state plans to present text messages between Burke and Hernandez that allegedly show both the sexual nature of their relationship and her threatening to expose him, surveillance footage of Burke last driving the Tesla in July 2025, receipts for a body bag and two chainsaws, and forensic evidence linking blood in his garage to Hernandez's DNA.
The rise, the tour, the arrest
Burke built his following the way a lot of young artists do now: TikTok singles that went viral, a fanbase that snowballed, and eventually a debut album called Withered that was good enough to launch an international tour. That tour kicked off last July. In September, after Hernandez's remains were found in the Tesla registered in his name, the tour was cancelled.
He was arrested in April of this year, at age 21, and has been held without bail since. According to The Guardian, his defense team said at the time of his arrest that he "was not the cause" of Hernandez's death, and he has pleaded not guilty to all charges. If convicted of murder, he faces either the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Several of Burke's former collaborators have since distanced themselves from him. The music industry, for once, did not take very long to do the math.
A family asking for basic justice
In April, after Burke's arrest was announced, Celeste's family released a statement. It was not angry, or political, or lengthy. It was just the words of a family describing a girl they loved.
"Celeste was a beautiful, strong girl who loved to sing and dance," they wrote, as reported by The Guardian. "Every Friday night was movie night and we spent wonderful times together. We love her very much and she always told us that she loved us. We miss her deeply. All we want is justice for Celeste."
She liked to sing. She liked to dance. She was 13. That is what this case is actually about, underneath all the forensic details and legal proceedings and celebrity-adjacent coverage.
The delays and the evidence mountain
The preliminary hearing has been a long time coming. The Guardian reports the case saw several delays, attributed in part to the sheer volume of investigatory evidence prosecutors have assembled. That is not a small thing. The amount of material required to document what is alleged here is genuinely staggering.
Among the items prosecutors intend to exhibit, according to court documents: text message chains between Burke and a 13-year-old girl, chainsaw purchase records, a body bag receipt, surveillance footage, and DNA evidence connecting blood in a garage to a child's remains. The question at this preliminary hearing is not whether any of that is damning. The question is whether it clears the legal bar for a full murder trial. Prosecutors appear confident it does.
The Dingo Take
There is no comedy here. Not even the dark kind. There is a 13-year-old girl who allegedly had a tattoo of a grown man's name on her finger, and that man allegedly cut the finger off before dumping her body in a car. There is a family that spent every Friday watching movies with her and now has to sit outside a courtroom and wait to find out if a jury will hear the case. That is what this is.
What it is also, unfortunately, is a story that will attract a certain kind of attention because Burke was famous. Because the algorithm blessed him. Because his songs are on playlists people still listen to. None of that context matters to the charges. None of it matters to Celeste Rivas Hernandez, who was in middle school when prosecutors say this began. The fame is not a mitigating factor. It is, if anything, the alleged motive.
The family asked for justice. That is a low bar. Clear it.
