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OFFICIALS IN THE US have confirmed that a 14-year-old girl found dead in US singer D4vd’s car died from “multiple penetrating injuries”.
The Los Angeles Medical Examiner also ruled the death of Celeste Rivas Hernandez as homicide.
The teenage girl was found at 11am on 8 September, 2025, in the front trunk of a Tesla in a tow yard in Los Angeles.
The Tesla, which was registered to D4vd in Texas, had been parked on the street in the upscale Hollywood Hills for around a month before it was towed.
The 21-year-old D4vd, whose legal name is David Burke, has been charged with first-degree murder, lewd and lascivious acts with a person under 14 and mutilating a body.
He pleaded not guilty earlier this week to a murder charge.
The cause and manner of Celeste’s death were determined on 9 December, 2025 but a court order initiated by the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) previously prevented the Medical Examiner from releasing its findings.
In a statement yesterday, Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Odey Ukpo said he was “grateful this information can now be released, not only to the public, but also to the grieving family enduring loss”.
“It is unfathomable they have had to wait this long to learn what happened to their daughter,” he added.
Dr Ukpo said the “transparency of the information” contained in the findings is “essential for empowering the community to make informed changes to reduce fear and allowing the community to take informed action”.
He remarked that making the information publicly available is “not just about accountability, it is about social justice and prevention”.
“By ensuring access to this information, we strengthen our ability to learn, to act, and ultimately to prevent the next tragic loss of life.”
Authorities allege that D4vd killed Miss Rivas Hernandez to protect a career on the rise after she threatened to report their sexual relationship.
His debut album, Withered, was released just two days after Miss Rivas Hernandez was last known to be alive.
She was reported missing by her family in 2024, when she was 13.
That was her age when, according to allegation in a criminal complaint, the singer engaged in continuous sexual abuse of her for at least a year from September 2023 to September 2024.
Authorities said she was killed with a sharp object on or around 23 April 2025, and was headed to the singer’s house in the Hollywood Hills.
Prosecutors allege D4vd mutilated her body about two weeks later.
D4vd, pronounced David, went viral on TikTok in 2022 with the hit Romantic Homicide, which peaked at No. 4 on Billboard’s Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart.
He then signed with Darkroom and Interscope Records and released his debut EP Petals to Thorns and a follow-up, The Lost Petals, in 2023.
The Associated Press confirmed that D4vd was dropped by Interscope last year.
-With additional reporting from Press Association
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