Newly revealed text messages between D4vd and late teen Celeste Rivas Hernandez indicate she fell pregnant over a year before her death.
The music artist, real name David Anthony Burke, has been accused of murdering the 14-year-old whose remains were found in a Tesla registered to his name in September last year. He was subsequently arrested in April and charged with her murder.
Prosecutors accused him of killing her after she threatened to reveal he had been abusing a minor and destroy his career. The 21-year-old pled not guilty to the charges of murdering and sexually abusing the teenage girl.
A preliminary hearing is now underway where prosecutors are seeking to convince a judge there is enough to proceed to trial.
In the latest development, text messages between Burke and Hernandez were shown to the court, which reveal the teenager had an abortion a year prior to her death.
In one January 2024 exchange, Burke, who would have been 19 and she 13, apologised for ‘putting [her] through this’.
She replied: ‘It’s okay. Neither of us are capable of watching and taking care of the baby. it’s for the best no?’
He later clarified if the baby was his, to which she said: ‘Of course it’s yours David.’
Later in June 2024, she messaged: ‘What [if] the first abortion didn’t work?’
That month he also wrote: ‘Let’s let this abortion be the last one til we have the real one…’
Data recovered by prosecutors from the defendant’s iCloud shows text exchanges between the pair dating back to August 2022, when Hernandez was 11 and Burke, 17.
In April, it was also revealed that Burke’s phone was filled with a ‘significant amount’ of child sexual abuse images.
The device also had photos of the teenager during the alleged sexual abuse, prosecutors and Los Angeles Police Detective Corey Farell said on Friday.
The preliminary hearing in July has also brought to light horrific details surrounding Hernandez’s death, including the court being shown images of her dismembered corpse.
Her parents’ lawyer, Patrick Steinfeld, called the ordeal ‘extremely painful’ for the family, with the mum, Mercedes Martinez, reportedly sobbing throughout.
‘This is the first time they’ve heard this evidence in detail, and they’re horrified,’ Steinfeld also told the BBC after the court hearing.
‘There was an image of Celeste’s torso and her head in the trunk of the car, and the prosecutor had to ask what it was because you could not tell it was a head. It was absolutely deplorable.
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‘They’re at a loss for words and they’re just trying to do the best they can.’
Meanwhile, a homicide detective reportedly testified that Burke had ordered chainsaws, an inflatable pool, a shovel, and a body bag online just days after her death.
Hernandez was last seen alive in April 2025 when she entered the rapper’s home in the Hollywood Hills.
Now Burke faces a string of charges including: First-degree murder with special circumstances, including lying in wait, committing the crime for financial gain, murdering a witness to an investigation, lewd and lascivious sexual acts with a person under 14 years old, and the mutilation of a human body.
The punishment for these charges could be as severe as the death penalty.