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As a warning, some of the following reporting is very graphic and disturbing, so please watch and listen
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with care. Singer songwriter David Anthony Burke, better known by his stage name David,
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which is spelled D4 VD, was back in court this week for a preliminary hearing. Now, in a preliminary hearing,
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the prosecution and defense present evidence to a judge who then decides if the proof is substantial enough to move
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on to a trial. Before the hearing began, it was anticipated to last at least 3 days. In April, 21-year-old David was
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charged with the murder of 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez. The teenagers dismembered remains were discovered in
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the front trunk of David's impounded Tesla in September of 2025. The hearing started Tuesday on a gruesome note with
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the prosecution presenting photos of Celeste's dismembered body after her body was discovered in the impounded
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Tesla. CBS News reports that Celeste was unrecognizable given that her body was found 5 months after she was last seen.
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And when the grizzly images were presented, David appeared blankfaced, slumped in the chair that he was chained
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to. In addition to the murder charge, David has been charged with continuous sexual abuse of a child under the age of
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14, the unlawful mutilation of human remains as well. The murder charges include what they call special
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circumstances, lying in weight, committing the crime for financial gain, and murdering the witness in an
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investigation. A special circumstance means that if convicted, David faces the death penalty
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or life in prison without the possibility of parole. The LA County DA has not yet announced if they'll seek
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the death penalty. David has pleaded not guilty to all charges. I'm 48 hours correspondent Ann Marie Green and this
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is Case by Case. We've been following this case now for a few episodes. So, if you want to revisit that coverage, just
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check our case by case podcast feed and the 48 Hours YouTube channel. Back when we last discussed this case, the Los
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Angeles County District Attorney's Office had shared a brief on April 29th regarding preliminary hearing evidence
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alleging that Celeste was 11 years old when she first met David, and messages between the two suggested sexual
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relationship may have started when she was 13. A preliminary hearing was supposed to take place in late May, but
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it kept on getting pushed back until it finally began earlier this week. This case has received a lot of attention,
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giving David's budding career in the music business. At one point, opening for Grammy award-winning artist Siza and
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creating tracks for the wildly popular Fortnite video game. With me today to discuss what came out of court is Los
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Angeles Times investigative crime writer Richard Winton. Richard, thanks so much
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for joining us. uh returning to this podcast to talk about this. Um you know, you were in the courtroom, so I think I
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want to start with just sort of give us a lay of the land and then we'll talk about some of the pretty disturbing
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evidence that came out. But we know that in the courtroom they presented um some
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photographs of Celeste, Celeste alive, Celeste not alive, her family was there. This must have been really tough for
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them to see and hear. >> Yeah. I mean, it was clearly as the prosecutor makes begins the presentation
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shortly into it a little bit, she says, and you she mouths it more than she actually physically says it. Are you
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okay? To the towards the mom quite clearly. And then she goes and comforts her at the first break because yes,
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they're showing images of Celeste, the very alive teenager, and then human remains, which are as the
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detective Bias, who Josh Buyers, who's the lead detective, described them. There wasn't really, she didn't really
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have a face. Uh, two of the fingers were removed because they would, as prosecutors allege, connect David to her
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because one of those fingers had his name on. So, yeah, there was very dramatic. But it even beyond that, like
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there was later on there was some testimony where a CHP officer, a California highway officer
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recovered her passport card at a near a lake somewhere. and up in Santa Barbara County and even that the mom reacted to
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almost more so obviously you know it's deeply personal heartfelt and yes she was seeing she
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cried in the corridor outside as well there's like a area outside I mean and they've been very quiet they're not
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going with like a big public spectacle they're not talking you know sometimes in these kind of cases you get they're
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not doing that kind of thing here >> right are They are they expected to testify any members of her family?
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>> Not at this stage. They are not going to testify. >> Um so the preliminary hearing uh it's
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taking place on the 9inth floor of the LA County uh superior courthouse. Uh you have told us that a lot of high-profile
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cases have taken place there. Is there a particular reason why that location ends
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up being the location for so many high-profile cases? >> Um basically in Los Angeles that's like
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the high security level corridor. though typically highlevel gang murders, you name it, high celebrity cases, but more
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uh violent crimes always. That was where for people who may remember, Judge Lanceto's courtroom was.
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>> When you bring up Ido, that was the judge in OJ Simpson's case. >> Yes. Yes. So when you're on you're a
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judge on this floor, you know you will get the most important cases and the most media attention cases in Los
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Angeles. that floor has extra security measures. >> The lead prosecutor in this case, uh,
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her name is Beth Silverman. She's got a nickname. LA magazine once called her the sniper. Where does that come from?
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>> Uh, I'm not really sure how that name came about cuz as I described Beth, she's not someone who would be hiding in
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the long range area of something. She's more directly confrontational and a very
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aggressive prosecutor. She did the Grim Sleeper, which was the serial killer who
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killed numerous women in South LA. Yeah. Be Beth is a no take no prisoners prosecutor. But as as one of her
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colleagues once told me, she if your family members murdered, she's the one you want to prosecute it.
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>> He is being represented, as you mentioned, by some high-profile attorneys. Blair Burke's one, Regina
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Peter is another, uh Marilyn Bernardski is another. Uh Blair Burke, as you point
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out, no stranger to celebrity cases uh in 2017. Uh she joined Harvey Weinstein's defense
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team when he was first facing accusations of sexual harassment and assault. Everyone may recall there was a
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case in New York, but then there was also in 2022 a case in California. He was convicted on one count of rape and
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two counts of sexual assault. Uh Burke also represented clients like Mel Gibson in his 2011 case uh after he was accused
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of domestic abuse of his ex-girlfriend at the time, Oxana. Uh there there was a a negotiated sort of deal, a no contest
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plea deal. So Mel Gibson avoided jail time. Um, in this case, do you after sort of hearing what you've
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heard from the prosecution or from the defense, is this the type of case where a plea deal for something could be
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presented? >> In this case, there's the very minimum right now, they're seeking life without
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parole. Most of negotiations in California cases over with in accusations of murder and this is murder
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with financial gain, murder with special circumstances of lying in weight and there's also continuous sexual abuse
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alleged in this kind of case. Typically what happens is the the defense if they are going to negotiate are trying to
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negotiate a deal where their client one day walks out of prison, >> right? And so
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that's if there's going to be negotiation that would normally what it would be here with the district attorney
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of Los Angeles, Nathan Hawkman. This is a child murder. She's a child. You have to remember this. And you've got the
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sexual abuse element. And so his likelihood of Beth Silverman and him negotiating
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anything less than well just not it's basically not a negotiation life without parole is probably their
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kind of minimum. They may this may be and the case that Hawkman does seek the death penalty in because this case has
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kind of the bars which usually would push those buttons which are it's a child there's sexual
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abuse involved there's a patent planning he's saying lying and wait so if if he's
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ever to get use the death penalty it's either this or a child torture case because these are the cases if there's
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going to be one. >> Yeah. So, based on what you've heard so far, then could you you know what what
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do you foresee as perhaps the defense's arguments, what does it any sort of indication as to where the defense might
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go with this? >> Okay. So, during the prelim, this is a prelim in California. Basically, you
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just have this prepundonderance of the evidence. It's just like a very sort of lower standard. We're not talking beyond
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reasonable doubt. Most people have seen trials. You have to prove everything beyond reasonable doubt. It's a intense
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level of requirement. We see in this case, you know, we see a lot of physical evidence
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>> of basically blood all over the garage, and then there's there's all the purchases of chainsaws, body bags,
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strange trips in his car. We had a one of the forensic experts of the LAPD testified that it was likely based on
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the blood finds her body was actually in the frunk. [music] [singing] >> That was a snippet of David's 2022 song
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Romantic Homicide. The music video features a blindfolded David singing over the corpse of a young woman in what
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appears to be a blood stained wedding gown and quick cuts reveal bloody knives pouring out of a suitcase. The video has
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over 200 million views on YouTube and commenters can't help but to attach the lyrics to the artist's alleged crimes.
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Some viewers in the comments uh connect the date of the video's release on September 7th to Celeste's birthday.
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It's on the same day. He performed the song two years ago at PNC live studio session in Portland, Oregon. And a
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little over a year later, one commenter called it one of the most haunted songs of our generation. Social media blew up
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in reaction to the case. David is an artist who built his career online making YouTube videos and content around
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gaming and music. After the gruesome allegations in this case, it seems that his vast digital footprint looks to
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resurface in the leadup to the trial. So, Richard, the judge is currently evaluating the evidence with regards to
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this case. According to CBS News reporting, the prosecution has recovered over 40 terabytes of evidence. This is
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including data from David's phones and his iCloud account. And just to give you a sense of what that looks like, just
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one terabyte can account for at least 200,000 images. So the question here is, could some of this include David's own
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music? >> Yes, it's part of it's definitely part of the evidence. It's not it's the music
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he's published and the music he hasn't published as well, which may have lyrics referencing the the deceased. But mo
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importantly, and I think it's emotional, if they eventually go to trial, I think
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Beth Sil will want to show jurors this are some of the videos, some of the very graphic videos, not so much the lyrics,
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which often have bloody scenes, including one video where he drags a body to the back of a car and puts it in
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the trunk. I'm sure that she'll want to show that this is part of kind of the way he portrays things.
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I'm sure that that all the imagery around his kind of sort of low rent horror kind of persona visually will be
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something she would like to show jurors. It's often hard to sort of categorize a
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recording artist. So, a lot of this visual material is probably in those terabytes.
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>> But I think I, you know, I I thought the way you sort of summed it up was really
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good. When I looked at the words, I thought it's like a really simple, very short poem that, you know, outside
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of this context actually doesn't seem that interesting, but when you put it in the middle of a murder case, then it
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could become a problem. So, the purpose of the hearing this week was to determine if there's enough evidence to
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move forward um with a murder trial. >> Yeah. I mean really honestly the the standard of prelim is pretty low and
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this literally before the prelim Beth Silver Silman files this nine-page brief like back in April
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>> which pretty much lays out and this is very unusual. So there's two unusual >> I was going to ask you is that odd
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>> Blair Burke pushed very quickly which is your right in California law for a pre
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prelim as soon as possible. Right. I can tell from her questions in court, she's
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somewhat trying to work out, okay, how much of the stuff do they have solid? When the forensic people up
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there, she kept asking in her cross and so you were the first person in that scene. Did the detectives go in there?
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She like numerous times asked are they gloved up, masked up? >> She's not really asking about the
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forensic people because she knows they're going to be. She's asking about the others,
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>> right? Uh, let's review some of what came out of that brief. Starting with the claim that Celeste was allegedly 11
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years old when she first met David and messages between the two suggested a sexual relationship may have started 2
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years later when she was 13. And the brief also noted that Celeste had gone missing before.
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Can you talk about that? The prosecutors have alleged in their brief that they have
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uh proof of a sexual relationship between the two of them that includes messages, references to plan B, sex,
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abortion, and they did that's what they included in their sort of court briefing. In addition, she this is
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documented and we documented ourselves at the LA Times. She was reported missing to the Riverside County
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Sheriff's Department three times during that same period in which they were having their relationship.
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>> Prosecutors say there was a significant amount of child pornography found on David's phone. According to the
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prosecution, these communications ceased April 23rd, 2025, and this is when they
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believe Celeste died. Um, what was going on between Celeste and David starting with the night before?
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Basically, they they'd got into some an argument. It seems that she would be become jeal angry or jealous. This is
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what the prosecutors allege in their brief. They basically allege that she implied
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that she would tell the world about their relationship. She's a minor. It would be a crime. So, he brings her to
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the home via Uber. And once she's there, prosecutors allege in their in their filing document and partly from what the
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medical examiner alleges, she was stabbed twice that that evening. Um, interestingly, 20
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minutes after she already was documented as arriving by that Uber, he's like asking where she is.
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>> Kind of paints a picture. Yeah. the cover they that's when the prosecutors allege
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>> Mhm. >> that's when that cover up begins. >> That night he makes a strange driving
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trip in his Tesla all the way up to Santa Barbara County to a place called Lake Kachuma. We're not sure what
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exactly he did, but that happens to be where they found her passport ID card. They they can prove that that car went
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there. They have license plate readers. They have all kinds of stuff which show their vehicle moved along the track.
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They got c this stuff which tracks that vehicle. According to the prosecution, that's when he uses his various aliases
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to buy items which could only be described as the murder. If you're if you were supposedly trying to get rid of
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a body, this is what you would do kind of ABC. So, he starts ordering uh body bags, laundry bags.
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He will just chainsaws, a burn box, all these various items using sometimes an alias, Victoria
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Mendes, and another alias as well, a male name. And some of these items, prosecutors allege that, well, we know
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from testimony in court, two of those two of those chainsaws had no no blood on them. They were still in the garage.
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[snorts] So yeah, we can see how you know they're constructing and he used these aliases now on cross Blair Burke
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says well that sh you know basically >> was the the burn box ever used? Well no I mean I I've actually seen the thing
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someone actually shared me the image of the of the burn box. It still basically looks like you know it's been it's never
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been opened. There was also this bit about this the uh I think it's like a kitty pool or
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something in these blue fragments. >> Yes. So, as we heard from the criminalist in the prelim
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basically they found that kitty pool and it's I don't know it's it's not that small a kitty pool. It's it's a size
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which would fit a smaller person in it. And in in that kitty pool, what they found was that had had some slash marks.
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So it looked like a blade of some sai had been used in that pole. And the prosecutor, Bessel, basically alleges
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that's the remains of Celeste. They found in the embedded plastic material of that kitty paw because that's what it
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seems like very clearly happened. And so that is, you know, the prosecution's assertion uh that uh Celeste's body was
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dismembered uh in that pool and then that she was placed in the frunk or the front trunk of David's Tesla. Uh they
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argue that he parked his car around the corner from his home and then he goes on
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tour. That car was ultimately towed and pounded and then Celeste's remains were discovered inside. All of these details
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are incredibly graphic. They're disturbing. I know people want to hear from Celeste's family. They have not
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spoken publicly, but their attorney released a statement at the April hearing, and I want to read some of that
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for you. In light of the gruesome details emerging almost daily, the family has decided not to make any
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statements now or in the future. There are no words to express the indescribable pain the family is
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experiencing right now. They still have bills to pay and jobs they go to every day. All they want is time to grieve and
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heal. Please grant the Rivas Hernandez family grace and compassion. And Richard, there was also some public
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speculation that David may have financially supported Celeste's family at one point. Uh but CBS News received a
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statement from Celeste's brother. His name is Jesus Rivas and he said, "I never had any contact with this guy and
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we haven't received any money from him or anyone in his family." >> Yeah. I mean, there's nothing in
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evidence that they have there's any financial connection. There's there's no implication that they that he he knows
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even knows the family at this point. It's all now there is an implication that she did meet his family and that is
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in the court briefing by the by the district attorney. >> I think Richard, you know, it's it's a
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it's a reminder that though this is a high-profile case with a celebrity defendant,
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this is real life for them. Um, they still have to pay their bills. They still have to do all the things that
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they were doing. And then they still have to be kind of confronted with the media interest and the social media
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interest and the the the commentary and the comment section is doing what the comment section does and they're just a
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regular family. >> You know what's really interesting about this case is now we have a different
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sort of press. It's not just the press corps. There's all these social media influencers who are turning up to the
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proceeding who cover and follow the proceeding. And so, and they're all doing these videos and it's uh it's
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really an interesting dynamic, but it also means it just permeates out into the internet at just an incredible rate
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compared with other stories. So, I'm sure this family can hardly avoid this even
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>> in daily life. >> So, then as we look ahead, what's next? What details will we see coming out of
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the preliminary hearing that you think could inform the rest of the trial? >> In the end, the brief is basically what
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they're going to present. And that's a lot. And that was highly unusual as one. We talked to a couple of other former
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prosecutors and they said they never seen anyone file a what is mounts to a trial brief at a prelim. Other words,
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oh, we're going to tell you, we're going to be totally transparent. This is we got all this already. So, you thought we
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weren't ready? Oh, no. We have all this stuff. >> How do you think Blair Burke and and
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Beth Silverman will be approaching this case? >> Well, Beth Silverman seems to be being
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very just blunt and direct. I mean, the the fact that she brought a prelim brief, which detailed most a lot of her
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case, >> the fact that she just doesn't seem to be >> hiding much. >> Well, I tell you, Richard, it's already
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kind of a hell of a case. my heart just breaks for Celeste's family. I feel for them because yeah, this is now a
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celebrity case. And so the level of attention that they're going to be getting um is going to be a tough one
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for them. Um Richard, you keep coming back to talk to us and we really appreciate it. Um and I know that we'll
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be continuing to discuss as this case unfolds. >> Thank you. >> And we'll be at back next week with
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another episode of Casey by Case. Be sure to rate and review and let us know which cases you are following and you
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[music] want us to follow as well. [music]