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Published 09:53 25 Apr 2026 GMT
The moment D4vd revealed his favorite line in his song 'Romantic Homicide' has resurfaced amid the recent release of the cause of death for the teenage girl he is charged with killing.
The case surrounding alt-pop singer D4vd has taken another grim turn after authorities confirmed the cause of death of 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez as "penetrating injuries."
An autopsy report released Wednesday, April 22, found the teen died from multiple penetrating injuries after months of delay, with prosecutors this week moving to unseal findings that had been held back by court order. The Los Angeles County medical examiner had determined in December that her death was a homicide, but details were only now made public.
The 21-year-old singer, whose legal name is David Burke, was charged Monday, April 20, with first-degree murder, lewd and lascivious acts with a person under 14, and mutilating a dead body. He has pleaded not guilty, while his attorneys insist he did not cause Celeste’s death and say they will vigorously defend his innocence.
According to the autopsy, Celeste suffered significant wounds to her torso believed to have been caused by a sharp object, with one wound penetrating her liver.
“After several months, I am grateful this information can now be released, not only to the public, but also to the grieving family enduring loss,” the medical examiner, Dr Odey C Ukpo, said in a statement. “It is unfathomable they have had to wait this long to learn what happened to their daughter.”
Police found the teen’s dismembered and decomposed remains in September in bags in the trunk of a Tesla registered to Burke and abandoned in the Hollywood Hills. The condition of her remains delayed the determination of a cause of death, Los Angeles police chief Jim McDonnell said earlier this week.
The report also detailed that her body had degraded so severely examiners could not determine her eye color. She had braces at the time of death and a tattoo reading “Shhh….” on the inside of a finger. Two fingers and parts of her arms and legs were missing.
Nathan Hochman, the LA district attorney, said Burke engaged in a sexual relationship with Celeste and alleged she went to his home on 23 April 2025 and was never heard from again.
Prosecutors claim he killed the teen because she threatened to report the relationship, which they allege began when she was 13, and he feared it would destroy his rising career.
The murder charge includes special circumstances alleging lying in wait, killing for financial gain to maintain his “lucrative” career, and murdering a witness to an investigation. A criminal complaint alleges he killed her with a sharp object and dismembered her body about two weeks later.
As the allegations have sent shockwaves through fans, renewed attention has also turned to a resurfaced video from November 2022, where D4vd discussed the lyrics behind his breakout song 'Romantic Homicide'.
In a YouTube video with Genius, the singer broke down each verse of the track and revealed his favorite line from the song.
He said at the time: “‘Enlighten me, my dear’ is my favorite line because you can take so many different meanings out of it and it's an emotion in itself. Everything has a meaning behind it.
"I think that's what poetry is; it's like an interpretation and another person can read the same thing and take something else out of it and find new things every time. So I think that's an important part of my process is definitely the poetry aspect of it. And all of my songs, I think, are poetry.”
Those comments have resurfaced in a far darker light as the criminal case moves forward and scrutiny around the singer intensifies.
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