00:00:00
Hi Crime Junkies, I wanted to bring you some breaking news. There have been some
00:00:04
developments in the murder of Celeste Rivas Hernandez. You guys know that singer David has been charged with her
00:00:11
murder and there were just some new documents released that tell us some really disturbing things about what led
00:00:17
up to her murder and I'm hearing like basically like the kill kit he ordered off Amazon after that kind of before
00:00:25
that all of the things and to bring us the update it's not going to be me guys. Crime Junkie just hired a breaking news
00:00:33
reporter an Emmy winning true crime reporter who my Arizona Crime Junkies might recognize Briana Whitney. So glad
00:00:41
to be here. So what is going on? Fill everyone in. So we knew this case was sad off the bat but now we've learned
00:00:49
months later after Celeste Rivas Hernandez's body was found that the singer David D4VD spelled like that had
00:00:56
this whole plan and we now know how exactly he killed her according to prosecutors. So she was found in the
00:01:02
back of his Tesla trunk. It was in a Hollywood Hills tow yard and nobody knew what was going on for so long until
00:01:09
there was a really bad smell coming from the Tesla. So there's some calls out to
00:01:12
the tow yard hey can somebody come check this. They go they find her body dismembered in cadaver bags is how it
00:01:20
was listed in the documents at first. Where's he getting cadaver bags? Well, now we know from Amazon among other
00:01:25
things. How do you I did not know Amazon sold cadaver bags. And it makes me have some questions for
00:01:32
Jeff Bezos like I mean I know you can get anything on Amazon but like literally anything.
00:01:36
>> Well, apparently now we've learned he also ordered a burn cage from Amazon. What's a burn cage?
00:01:41
>> Something to destroy evidence in like you can put things in it and then you burn it in this cage.
00:01:46
Who knew what that was? I didn't. So that's part of this. So there's this secretive grand jury investigation
00:01:51
that's going on for months. They knew Celeste and David knew each other. It was his car obviously. So he's
00:01:57
immediately uh you know, under suspicion from everybody. >> mean, I remember when the when we start
00:02:02
first started hearing about this, everyone kind of was waiting for the arrest because of that. They're like,
00:02:07
this teenage girl was found in this car dead in this car, and then it was crickets. Right. 14 years old, she was
00:02:14
found the day before she was going to turn 15. Horrible. Horrible. So, it was really confusing to people. Why weren't
00:02:21
there charges sooner? And honestly, from the new documents, we still don't know why there weren't charges sooner, but we
00:02:26
do know that there was clearly premeditation according to what prosecutors are saying. So, it was just
00:02:30
a couple weeks ago that he was finally arrested after a grand jury came back with an indictment. First-degree murder,
00:02:36
sexual abuse of a child, and mutilation of body parts. We didn't really know at that time
00:02:42
how this all unfolded until court documents were just released this week because they're getting ready for this
00:02:47
preliminary evidence hearing. So, basically, the prosecution is like, here's what we're going to present in
00:02:53
this hearing. Here's the evidence we're going to come up with. And it's incredibly disturbing.
00:02:58
Basically, we learned that the two of them met when Celeste was 11 11 years old, and when she was 13 years
00:03:05
old, they started having a sexual relationship. Yeah. So, they're in this relationship, they traveled everywhere
00:03:11
together, even you know, to London and places like this. Like, this was a serious thing. And her she was a chronic
00:03:16
runaway. So, her family had reported her missing multiple times, but at some point, she just never was seen again.
00:03:22
Nobody had heard from her, nobody knew what happened until her body was found. They still didn't know when she died or
00:03:27
what exactly happened until they got into the investigation. So, now we've learned from these new documents that
00:03:33
Celeste and David were on the outs, and Celeste was jealous of the fact that he was seeing other women at this point
00:03:40
after promising her >> Women or girls? Because like, I don't Great question. Does he Does he actually
00:03:44
date women his own age? >> Unclear. So, seeing other people, and Celeste was feeling jealous about this
00:03:51
because he had put you know, promised that they were going to be together. They had had all these experiences
00:03:55
together. Also, she was so young. How would she know better? And she said, "Look, I'm I'm going to ruin your life.
00:04:02
I'm going to ruin your career, and I'm going to ruin your life because I'm going to out what we've been doing. Out
00:04:07
that we've had a sexual relationship." And >> abusing her. Yeah. Yeah. So, this is
00:04:12
where this special circumstance comes into play on the murder charge, lying in wait. They believe that in April of
00:04:19
2025, he lured her over to his home, and he even texted her, "Hey, when are you getting here?" And that's where they say
00:04:26
he stabbed her multiple times, killed her, and her cell phone activity obviously ceased after that. Yeah,
00:04:31
completely stopped. So, they believe that's exactly when it happened. The night before they were having this
00:04:35
argument about who was dating who. Wait, and then when is she found in the car? September?
00:04:40
So, she was in likely in that car for many many months, which is why the decomposition was so bad. We now know
00:04:48
from these court documents stabbed her multiple times, watched her bleed out. Horrible. And then it gets it gets
00:04:54
worse. He was getting ready to release a new album. He was also on tour. So, he allegedly kills her. He then goes on the
00:05:01
radio to promote his new album that same day. He then Postmates a shovel from Home
00:05:08
Depot. And then proceeds to order a slew of concerning items from Amazon. Multiple chainsaws,
00:05:16
an inflatable pool, and other things. Like it's like certain things like I don't understand how you don't get
00:05:23
flagged. I feel the same way when I see like surveillance footage of people at at Home Depot or something like that.
00:05:29
And they're like, "Here's my duct tape. Here's my tub. Here's my like >> bleach. I don't know.
00:05:34
I don't know. Okay. And again, like who knew this was available on Amazon? So, he orders these things. They then say
00:05:41
that he used the chainsaws to dismember her in the inflatable pool so that the blood would not seep out and then put
00:05:50
those in the cadaver body bags that he ordered from Amazon as well and put those into the back of his trunk.
00:05:58
Again, who is ordering cadaver body bags from Amazon? Like our coroner's office is doing this or like again, should
00:06:04
there be some kind of list somewhere that immediate red flag. And there's been Amazon order history that is
00:06:11
brought up in court cases before. So, you obviously now is going to be part of it. So, yeah, like why is that not
00:06:16
flagged on the front end? It's also like I feel like again, everything I what I don't understand
00:06:22
it seems like he was like making plans to like get rid of her. Right. But she's but she's just in his trunk. Like he
00:06:28
doesn't actually get rid of her. He like dismembers her but then leaves her in the car that's connected to him.
00:06:34
Yeah, and I don't know if he just thought no one's ever going to find this car in the tow yard, which
00:06:38
no. But also, he only got rid of two things, two fingers. He amputated her fingers according to prosecutors because
00:06:47
she had his name tattooed on her ring finger and they've never found the fingers. Like why get rid of the two
00:06:52
fingers if you're going to leave the body in the trunk? Not obviously none of it makes any sense at all.
00:06:57
>> Do you think he wanted to keep it because it was like that's the thing that had his name on it? Like a memento?
00:07:02
I don't know. >> Like a trophy from it? I I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. So,
00:07:07
obviously awful. Her Here's what's weird though. Her DNA, her blood was found in the inflatable
00:07:16
pool that he oh, kept in his garage after this. Yeah, and they served a search warrant just days after her body
00:07:22
was found in September. So, then what the hell took this this long to get to an arrest? I know she I like I
00:07:29
get that she had to been severely decomposed. >> Right. But there's no way like his
00:07:34
Amazon search like you his Amazon search history, you have her phone, you know she's going to meet him, you know she
00:07:39
got an Uber to his place, you know her phone goes off, he's got the pool, and didn't they find like pieces of the pool
00:07:46
in the trunk with her or like in the body bag with her something like that? >> Yeah, her her DNA was found in these
00:07:53
like cut pieces of plastic that was in the pool and then also in the body bag. So like the parts of the pool ended up
00:07:59
in the cadaver bag. Yes. >> Why did this take a year? I don't know and that's what's really bizarre. So
00:08:03
we've asked the LA District Attorney Nathan Hochman, his office reached out and asked, "Look, clearly you had the
00:08:09
search warrant, the evidence came back, they used dental records to identify her, you had all of this, so why are we
00:08:16
just getting charges now?" And and and on top of that it wasn't even like a oh, let's figure out who could be a possible
00:08:23
suspect or possibly involved. Everyone knew. The I mean the public were making accusations from day one and I know you
00:08:30
can't arrest someone on like public accusations, but to your point, it's not like we're like oh,
00:08:35
this didn't feel like a whodunit. No. No, and they had like every type of evidence possible. You had direct
00:08:41
evidence, you had blood DNA, you had forensic digital evidence with the phone and the text messages, you had his own
00:08:46
car. So we're still waiting for information on that back because yeah, I mean why did it take so long? They obviously
00:08:53
sent it to a grand jury, that's fine, but still I mean he's been walking around. He did cancel his tour after
00:09:00
this after she was found, but was he actually like a big artist? I had never heard of him. I hadn't heard of him
00:09:04
either, but people that I worked with had heard of him and had gone to his concerts in Phoenix. So I mean he had
00:09:10
definitely been around. I think he was like an up-and-coming artist and so also in the charges they say that he part of
00:09:16
the motive was that this was like for financial gain and so as he was getting bigger as an artist,
00:09:24
they believed that her tearing him down, he was like oh, I'd lose all this money
00:09:28
and lose my career. What did you think committing murder was going to do? Yeah, I don't know where he
00:09:33
thought or where he didn't think that part through. I mean that so that's what happened. It's just so sad though.
00:09:38
>> Has he made any kind of like statement or like his defense or anything about like Do we have any indication what like
00:09:43
what he's going to even try and claim at the trial? >> not guilty, but that can always change.
00:09:48
I mean, I've seen it come up to trial and they can take a plea deal right away. So, what's next?
00:09:54
>> last minute. So, now they'll have this evidentiary hearing. They're going to present this or the prosecution's going
00:10:00
to present this in court and then we'll go from there and see where the case goes, but I mean, first-degree murder
00:10:05
they're looking into whether they're going to pursue the death penalty. They'll only go so far with California
00:10:09
because they don't really put people to death there, but I mean, the fact that they're even looking into it
00:10:14
it's telling. And you're following it, I assume? >> Yes, following it for months, still
00:10:18
going to follow it. Obviously, we'll keep the Crime Junkies up to date on this one. Yep, you guys, we got Briana
00:10:23
now, so expect some updates coming soon.