At least 11 air fresheners from brand names including Purell and Febreze were found inside D4vd’s Tesla along with the decomposing remains of 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez.
Testifying on the second day of a preliminary hearing, LAPD Criminalist Chelsea
Murillo said she recovered most of the air fresheners from the center console of the Tesla Model X, though others were scattered in the rear seats and in the front trunk. She also found extensive “insect activity” in the front trunk and noticed “a strong odor” when she helped process the vehicle on Sept. 9, 2025. Rivas’ remains had been found in the car’s front trunk the day before.
“The odor resembled a decomposing body, based on my professional experience,” she said. Prosecutors showed a photo of the recovered air fresheners, as well as one depicting a large patch of pale yellow fly larvae inside the vehicle.
Muriollo only testified for a few minutes before the lunch break. She followed a California Highway Patrol Officer who testified that he collected Celeste’s U.S. Passport ID from a transit worker who found it off a Santa Barbara highway on Jan. 7, 2026. The card, issued on May 20, 2022, was shown on the screen in court, with a photo of Celeste as an 11-year-old appearing prominently, set against a blue pattern with an eagle and stars.
D4vd, the 21-year-old singer born David Anthony Burke, watched the testimony while seated in an orange jail uniform at the defense table. He has pleaded not guilty to murdering Rivas on April 23, 2025, at his Hollywood Hills home to cover up his alleged sexual abuse of the girl, who was five years younger.
Earlier in the day, the court heard from Louis Poimiroo, a senior vice president of finance at Interscope, Burke’s label. Prosecutors sought his testimony to support their claim that Burke killed Rivas to protect a lucrative career. Poimiroo detailed Interscope’s total payments to Burke and his companies from 2022, when he signed with Interscope and its imprint, Darkroom, through 2025. This included $3.8 million in 2023 and $2.2 million in 2025. He confirmed that Interscope terminated Burke’s deal at the end of 2025 and has paid him nothing in 2026.
Burke’s preliminary hearing began on Tuesday (July 22), when prosecutors shared graphic photographs of Rivas’ decomposed and dismembered remains found in the Tesla. The images showed her head and torso in one black plastic bag, and her arms and legs in another. Prosecutors said flecks of blue plastic on her right knee came from an inflatable pool Burke allegedly used to collect blood while dismembering her body.
Rivas’ mother, Mercedes Martínez, bowed her head and cried in the front row of the courtroom as the photos were shown. Burke, seated at the defense table wearing an orange jail uniform, showed no visible emotion.
LAPD Det. Joshua Byers testified that decomposition had made it impossible to identify Rivas by her face: “The skin slippage made it unrecognizable.” Byers also revealed that Burke had the name “Celeste” tattooed in cursive red ink on his left ring finger when he was arrested in April.
The preliminary hearing is expected to last several days, after which a judge will decide whether prosecutors have presented enough evidence to send the case to trial. Burke’s lawyers sought Tuesday to expose gaps in the investigation, questioning why the exterior of his Tesla and items from his home had not undergone more extensive testing, including DNA analysis.
Prosecutors allege Burke summoned Rivas to his Hollywood Hills home in an Uber on April 23, 2025, stabbed her to death in her upper abdomen, then left on a promotional tour for his album Withered. They say he later returned to Los Angeles, dismembered her body, and concealed the remains in his Tesla.
Burke has pleaded not guilty to murder, continuous sexual abuse of a child under 14, and unlawful mutilation of human remains. Burke’s lawyer, Blair Berk, has said the evidence will show that he did not murder Rivas or cause her death.
If convicted as charged, he faces life in prison without parole or the death penalty. Prosecutors have not said whether they will seek a death sentence.
During the first day of the preliminary hearing yesterday (July 21), Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman played about 10 minutes of body-camera footage showing Los Angeles County Sheriff’s deputies visiting Burke in February 2024, days after Rivas’ parents first reported her missing. Riverside County investigators had found Burke’s number in the teen’s phone records, informed him of her age, and warned him that deputies would visit, prosecutors allege. Burke told the deputies that he had met Rivas on Discord and Instagram and had seen her once in person, at a Lake Elsinore home in November 2023. He also claimed Rivas told her she was 18, and said they had last communicated four days earlier.
Prosecutors allege that after Rivas returned home soon after, and that her parents confiscated her phone. Burke allegedly bought Rivas a burner phone and paid a classmate $1,000 to deliver it. Byers testified that investigators later found evidence that Burke traveled with Rivas to Texas and London and purchased both of their airline tickets.
Byers also outlined evidence that prosecutors say places Burke behind the wheel of the Tesla when it was abandoned. Data from the car showed that Burke’s unrecovered iPhone 16 disconnected from the vehicle at 2:18 p.m. on July 29, 2025. Two minutes later, a neighbor’s camera recorded Burke walking back toward his rental house, Byers testified.
Automated license-plate readers on passing LAPD vehicles repeatedly recorded the Tesla in the same parking spot between July 29 and Sept. 8, suggesting that it remained there until it was impounded.
Byers testified that Burke bought two chainsaws on Amazon on May 1, using the alias Trayvion Davis. He said the singer purchased a third chainsaw from Home Depot three days later and had it delivered through Uber Postmates. That chainsaw was never recovered. Records showed that Burke also bought a mop-and-bucket system on May 4, a “burn cage” on July 7, and a fireproof mat on July 12, Byers said.
Along with Byers, the first day of the hearing included testimony from Benjamin Greger, a former financial manager at Burke’s management company, Mogul Vision. Prosecutors also called him to support their contention that Burke killed Rivas to protect his career.
Greger, who said he still works for Burke’s family on a $7,500 monthly retainer, estimated that Burke had generated roughly $10 million to $11.5 million in gross earnings through recording, merchandising and music-publishing deals. He also confirmed that he had discussed transferring Texas properties held in Burke’s name to his mother, Colleen Burke.
“Do you remember testifying that the reason you told her to do that was to protect the estate from any civil suit, so the victim’s family wouldn’t be able to obtain those?” Silverman asked.
“I do recall, yes,” Greger replied.
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