LOS ANGELES — Grisly photos of the dismembered corpse of a teenage girl were made public Tuesday morning at a preliminary hearing in the murder case against the singer D4vd, who prosecutors say used a chainsaw to mutilate the corpse of Celeste Rivas Hernandez after he killed the young girl to cover up years of alleged sexual abuse.

Hernandez’s body was found in September 2025 inside the trunk of a Tesla registered to the singer, whose legal name is David Anthony Burke. The case immediately drew international headlines, but details of the crime scene had only been described in writing until the hearing against Burke began Tuesday morning.

Burke is charged with murder and continuous sexual abuse of Hernandez, a fan he met online when she was as young as 11 years old, court records have shown. Earlier this year, prosecutors made their theory of the case public after arresting Burke on murder and sex assault charges.

Fearing the collapse of his burgeoning music career, Burke invited Hernandez to his Hollywood Hills home and stabbed her twice after she threatened to expose him for sexually abusing her, prosecutors said in a nine-page court filing in April. Burke dismembered his victim’s body with a chainsaw and amputated two of her fingers to erase evidence of a tattoo linking the pair, according to the filing.

Burke has pleaded not guilty to all charges and denied wrongdoing through his attorneys. He appeared in court Tuesday in an orange jail jumpsuit and remained shackled to his chair.

The photos published Tuesday were taken at the Hollywood tow yard where Hernandez’s body was found in September 2025 in the trunk of a Tesla registered to Burke. Detective Josh Byers of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Robbery-Homicide Detective spoke calmly about the gruesome finds as Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman laid out images of Hernandez’s dismembered torso, displaying blood strewn across her remains and an image showing one of her arms cut off at the elbow.

Byers said detectives found a cadaver bag and a black plastic trash bag in the Tesla. Once the bag was opened, Byers said he saw “various limbs of a body, arms, legs that had been severed.” Byers said the victim’s legs had been sawed at the kneecap and cut into four pieces.

As she displayed the images, Silverman turned to the victim’s parents, who were seated in the front row, and appeared to mouth, “Are you OK?” On a break in the case, Silverman checked in with Hernandez’s loved ones and tried to comfort them. Hernandez’s parents are not expected to testify, Silverman said in court.

The preliminary hearing is expected to make public additional evidence against Burke, who has been a suspect in the girl’s death for nearly a year.

Hernandez’s body rotted for weeks before it was discovered, according to medical examiner’s records and court filings. Prosecutors have since said they believe the singer killed her last April. On Tuesday, Byers said her body was so badly decomposed that her face was “unrecognizable.” He said Tuesday he remembered finding insects, maggots and flies throughout the trunk on the day the body was discovered.

The preliminary hearing that began Tuesday is expected to last about four days. At a preliminary hearing, a judge decides whether prosecutors have enough evidence to proceed to trial. The hearings often result in displays of key evidence, including crime scene photos and items recovered after the execution of search warrants. Investigating officers almost always take the witness stand. In Burke’s case, a number of witnesses have already testified before multiple grand juries, but the records from those hearings are sealed.

Silverman has not said who she plans to call to testify this week, though it is common for prosecutors to exclusively summon law enforcement officials and medical examiners to the stand during a preliminary hearing in a murder case.

Burke’s lead attorneys, Blair Berk and Marilyn Bednarski, did not respond to a request for comment. It is not clear if they will call any witnesses.

It is unusual for a preliminary hearing to happen so fast. Burke was only arrested three months ago, and murder cases often languish in L.A. County courts for years before reaching a point where meaningful evidence is made public. But Burke’s attorneys pushed for an immediate hearing, claiming the prosecution’s case couldn’t stand up to scrutiny.

Legal experts said it appeared Berk was trying to stress test the prosecution’s case, but may have misfired as Silverman responded with a nine-page memo in late April that described Burke’s alleged crimes in detail.

“The defense thought the D.A. wasn’t ready, but I think Silverman is ready,” said Neama Rahmani, a former federal prosecutor.

Rahmani also noted celebrity clients often push their defense attorneys to fight a two-pronged battle: one in criminal court, the other in the media. Rushing into a preliminary hearing may have been part of a public relations strategy, rather than a wise legal move, Rahmani said.

“From a client control perspective, what D4vd may want is an aggressive attorney who will defend him in the press and push this to trial,” Rahmani said.

The New York-born singer gained fame by layering his own music over clips of the popular video game “Fortnite” and with the viral TikTok track “Romantic Homicide.” He first met Hernandez when she was 11 years old, the prosecutor’s memo said.

Hernandez’s family in Lake Elsinore reported her missing multiple times after she became entangled with Burke. Riverside County Sheriff’s Department investigators questioned Burke about Hernandez in February 2024 and dispatched two L.A. County Sheriff’s Department deputies to check on him at a West Hollywood residence, but he denied knowing anything about her, according to the district attorney’s office filing.

Two days after the investigators had their meeting with Burke, Hernandez returned home and her parents took away her phone. Burke, according to prosecutors, paid another teenager $1,000 to bring Hernandez a new device so they could stay in touch. Over the next year, Hernandez traveled with Burke to Las Vegas, Texas and London where she met “his family,” Silverman wrote in the filing.

The two began a sexual relationship when Hernandez turned 13 but “broke up” in late November 2024, according to Silverman’s court filing. Text messages between the two contained references to “sex, pregnancy, abortion and use of the Plan B emergency contraceptive,” she wrote. A search of Burke’s phone also turned up images of the teen performing sex acts, the prosecutor’s memo said.

Hernandez was last seen alive at Burke’s residence on April 23, 2025, when she took an Uber from Riverside County to his rented Hollywood Hills home, prosecutors have said. The night before, Hernandez and Burke got into an argument where she expressed “jealousy” over his relationships with other women, according to the filing. The teen then “threatened to disclose damaging information about her relationship with defendant to end his career and destroy his life,” Silverman wrote.

While prosecutors have not said exactly what happened when Hernandez arrived at Burke’s Hollywood home, an autopsy report published in April showed the teen died of two stab wounds.

After the girl died, prosecutors allege Burke took extreme steps to cover up the crime.

Prosecutors say Burke had a shovel, chainsaws, a “burn cage,” body bags and an inflatable pool delivered to his Hollywood home so he could destroy his victim’s remains. Authorities said in court filings that they believe Burke placed his victim’s body in the inflatable pool so it would prevent her blood from spilling on his property when he cut apart her body.

In the April court filing, Silverman said pieces of plastic from the pool were embedded in Hernandez’s remains when police finally found her body months later.

The case has drawn international attention, and dozens of onlookers descended on the downtown L.A. courthouse Tuesday morning eager to get a seat in the ninth-floor courtroom where the hearing would take place. At least 50 people gathered in the courthouse lobby around 8 a.m. as staff and sheriff’s deputies held a public lottery for extra seats in the gallery.

L.A. County District Attorney Nathan Hochman attended the proceeding and said he planned to address the media during an afternoon break.

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