Law&Crime Sidebar - Shocking Sex Images Found on D4vd's Devices: Prosecutors

Episode Date: April 23, 2026

Prosecutors revealed Thursday that David Burke, who uses the stage name D4vd, was allegedly in possession of significant amounts of child sexual abuse material. The shocking new details emerged as Burke's lawyers and Los Angeles prosecutors met with the judge to determine what's next in Burke's murder case. Law&Crime's Jesse Weber spoke with reporter Dina Doll about what went down inside the courtroom. PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: Go to http://www.gamingadvocates.com to start your free, confidential case evaluation.HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael Deininger, Christina O'Shea, Alex Ciccarone, & Jay CruzScript Writing & Producing - Savannah Williamson & Juliana BattagliaGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrimeTwitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Singer David and his legal team were back in Los Angeles court today, along with a team of L.A. prosecutors and our on-the-ground reporter, Dean Adal was inside. There are no cameras. She is our eyes and our ears. We're going to talk about what was discussed in court and what authority said they allegedly found on David's devices. And I will tell you right now, shocking. Welcome to Sidebar. Presented by Law and Crime. I'm Jesse Weber. Look, before we even go any further, I've got to tell you about this long crime legal alert, okay? Roblox. Roblox is under fire for allegedly not taking adequate safety measures to protect children on its platform. That's right. The popular virtual universe has millions of users who are minors, and yet players can apparently customize their avatars to hide their age and gender. Now, this is a feature that may also be available to predators with bad intentions. Look, you might not even realize the potential dangers that Roblox composed for your child,

But if your child was sexually abused or assaulted or groomed by someone they met on Roblox, you may qualify for potential compensation. Look, children, they may not know better, right? But the argument is Roblox should. And our legal sponsors are seeking justice for the families that were affected by this alleged gross negligence. So visit GamingAdvocates.com to start your free confidential case evaluation. Okay, so we have another court appearance in the David case. By the way, on the one-year anniversary of when prosecutors said,

when they claim he killed 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez. And by the way, we expected today to be a preliminary hearing where the court will hear evidence if there's enough probable cause that these alleged crimes were committed to move forward with the case. It's a legal barrier, lower standard, low bar, but you have to show that there is sufficient probable cause that he committed these crimes. And I'll talk about which ones he's charged with to move this case to the next stage. Here's the thing.

Wasn't a preliminary hearing today. No, it turns out even though a preliminary hearing was on the court calendar, this was more of a status conference. It's a check-in regarding next steps in the case. Now, if you thought that this was going to be a two-minute hearing and that was it, not the case. No, no, no, no, no, no. We are going to get into specifically what authorities claim they found on David's devices. I wonder if this is a whole new game here. I wonder if now we're talking potential federal charges if those allegations are true.

I'll get to that. But before you even get into what happened today, I just got to give it. you some context about this, okay? So we have talked about this before. Remember, when I'm mentioning a preliminary hearing, which I understand has now been scheduled for a later date, this goes back to the idea of the grand jury. We know that there were reports that a grand jury was impaneled to hear evidence in the case of this 21-year-old singer, but there was no grand jury indictment, right? There was no formal charges. No, instead, at the beginning of this week, the Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hockman, his office filed first-degree murder, continuous sexual abuse of a child under

14 and unlawful mutilation of human remains charges against David in connection with the death of Celeste. Remember, her decomposed and dismembered body was reportedly found September 8th, 2025 in the trunk of a car allegedly registered to David, real name David Anthony Burke. And he's also facing special circumstances allegations, right? Lying in wait, killing for financial gain, killing of a witness, using a sharp instrument, all with respect to the murder charge. And this is significant because this can carry heavier penalties if he's convicted of the murder charge. We're talking life in prison without the possibility of parole. We're talking the death penalty, even though there is a moratorium on executions in California. But this is why it's so significant why the prosecution

believes they have evidence to prove that. And the main idea here is essentially that David allegedly killed Celeste because she was going to expose him potentially about their illegal underage sexual relationship. I think that's the fair argument and that this was going to affect his career, which was a on the rise. Remember, he was on tour when all of this happened. Now, as we learned yesterday when the autopsy report was released that Celeste's official cause of death was multiple penetrating injuries and her manner of death was listed as homicide. We did a whole sidebar yesterday with Forensics Examiner Dr. Mary Jim Bellick. It's up on YouTube right now, up on our long crime YouTube. You can watch

the whole thing. Oh, and by the way, the full autopsy report, if you want to go through the details, if you want to see it for yourself, it's up on our app, Long, Crime Plus as well if you want to check it out. I actually think it's significant that we're putting these case files on the app because look, unfortunately in today's day and age, there's a lot of misinformation. There are a lot of AI tools someone can use to make fake reports or fake information. This is the official released autopsy report. It's up on Law and Crime Plus, so you can check it out there. But bottom line, David was charged by the DA's office, but in order for this to move forward, in order for this to go to a trial,

there has to be a legal determination that there is sufficient probable cause that David committed these crimes to move forward with this case. Again, lower standard. And if it's not by a grand jury, then it needs to be by a judge at a preliminary hearing. And by the way, preliminary hearing is a little bit different than a grand jury because grand jury proceedings are secret. The defense doesn't have an opportunity to challenge that evidence. Preliminary hearing in court in front of a judge, defense there. They get an opportunity to fight back against this. But anyway, brings us to today. This courthouse in downtown L.A.

By the way, just talking about a preliminary hearing for a second, David's attorneys, his defense attorneys pushed for a preliminary hearing immediately. They have said that he didn't commit this murder. They have said that he was not the cause of her death. But what happened today? Now, look, there were no cameras in the courtroom. The good news, we have our own eyes and ears. Okay, we have our own eyes and ears.

Attorney and legal analyst, Dean Adol was in that courtroom. good to see you, Dina. Thanks for taking the time. First of all, I need you to clarify what this hearing was because I think a lot of us thought this was going to be the preliminary hearing. We thought that was on the calendar. That was not the case, even though they did talk about when the preliminary hearing is going to be scheduled, right? Absolutely. It was calendar. It is a preliminary hearing, but the judge at the out south said, I'm sure that's not actually going to start today. Let's talk about it. And that's exactly what they did, scheduling it, and most importantly, talking about the discovery, the transferring

of what seems to be a mountain of evidence from the prosecution to the defense and the logistics of how that's going to happen. And I want to get into that because quite the headline, what was allegedly found on either David's phone or his devices, which we'll get to. But the preliminary hearing is scheduled for next week, right? And is this because there's just like you said, there's so much evidence to go through. There's so much data to go through. Well, this is significant. They have not waived their right to a speedy preliminary hearing. The very last day it could be under law was May 4th. But the judge said, I don't like to schedule it that last day because there could be unexpected circumstances just with a court system in general.

So they have scheduled it for May 1st. But significantly, they will all be back in front of the judge the afternoon of April 29th in order for the defense to determine whether or not the prosecution has handed over enough evidence where they think they can properly defend their client at the hearing. The judge making a point that although statutory law requires the prosecution to hand over everything prior to trial, they are not required to do that for preliminary hearing. They just have to hand over sufficient evidence that is most favorable to the defendant. in order to prove probable cause. So that afternoon of April 29th, the defense will determine if they think they have enough evidence to continue with this speedy preliminary hearing.

Dina, let me ask you this, the autopsy report that came out yesterday. Is that a reason why we didn't have a preliminary hearing today? Do they talk about that? Because there's a lot in that report. That's the official cause of death. We know the defense has said that David is not the cause of death. Did that come up today? That did not come up as they really spoke about the fact that they have a wide range of evidence that the defense has not getting. Specifically, they actually highlighted the fact that they have the significant amount of child pornography on his iPhone, but they did not get into the specifics of the medical examiner's report. Okay, so talk to me about the big bombshell. Apparently they found what or allegedly found what on David's devices.

So she said the words. The prosecution said a significant amount of child pornography. And she raised this saying it is going to be different. You cannot hand over that type of evidence to the defense as you would the rest of the evidence. The defense has to instead have somebody at a council, or an expert, go to the county and actually look at a determined computer to look at this because of the sensitive nature of that evidence. The prosecution also highlighting the amount of this evidence and evidence on the data and the cell phone in general because of the difficulty and how long it takes to hand and transfer over this kind of amount of evidence. Okay. Put your legal cap on.

Are we talking potential federal charges? You and I both know that if someone is caught with allegedly child sexual abuse material on their devices, that could be federal charges. That's a really great point. And it's very possible federal charges may come. At this point, though, it definitely is relevant and probative to one of the three charges. There are three charges against him. Murder, continuous child sex abuse, and mutilation of a corpse. So this specific child pornography evidence is definitely going to be used by prosecution for that continuous child sex abuse.

But whether or not the federal prosecutors decide to add charges, we will wait and see. Just want to clarify, any idea who was portrayed in these, you know, this footage, these videos, this data on his phone, is it Celeste? Is it someone else? Did prosecutors acknowledge that? And let me clear, let me be clear, allegedly on his phone, do we, did they say the identity of this person or persons? They did not say the identity. But even that specific phrase, you know, the press, there was a ton of press in the courtroom. Everybody had their laptops out taking notes and you just heard the chatter of the typing. Just the phrase significant amount of child pornography was enough to raise flags about what may be come,

this trial. What about, I read there was something about a wiretap and search warrants? Exactly. They said that there was a significant amount of evidence collected in a wiretap. There was also three different investigative grand juries, one convened in November, one in December, and one in February. The prosecution really trying to convey to the judge how much evidence they have and the difficulty of it to be able to be transferred to the defense that quickly. They did say, however, that they plan on handing the defense tomorrow, arrest records, photographic evidence, chemical evidence reports, and DNA evidence reports. Wait a second. Let's just take a step back here.

We always, we were debating whether or not there was a grand jury that was going to be investigating this case, right? locking in witness testimony, gathering evidence that they didn't have the power to indict. That was one thing. Now we're learning there were multiple grand juries that were all in this investigative function. Not one of them had the power to indict. That's what came out today. The prosecution said specifically investigative grand juries without the power to indict. And they said it was up to the defense to request that these. records be unsealed and the latest grand jury was what February that's what they

said February was the latest one what was the vibe in that courtroom let's start here what did David look like so when David came in he was in his orange jumpsuit he sat down his attorney Blair book immediately put her hand on his shoulder every time she confirmed her with her client she in fact put her hand on his shoulder. He vigorously nodded even every time the judge referred to him. If he asked her a question, he answered in the affirmative. At the very end, when she was explaining the process of how he's going to be brought back to the hearing and how he may have to wait, but make sure he's on time, he folded his hands in a prayer position. Otherwise, he was just quietly listening to the

proceedings and listening to his lawyers speak on his behalf. And, What about for the prosecution? Who was there? The prosecution, they had their attorneys. Interestingly, there were two young girls sitting next to the investigators. They were not referenced. They were not conferred with. We know that the Hernandez family said in advance. They did not plan on intending the hearing.

So it was unclear who those girls were. I just want to be clear about something. There have been rumors. there has been speculation that David has allegedly, allegedly has been charged, but allegedly maybe been involved with other minors. Are you, is there anything to indicate that those, and I want to make sure your terminology is correct, you're saying there were children, they're not women, they appear to be children were there. Is that somehow connected to other people that might allegedly be in David's orbit?

You do wonder, they were, they looked. I mean, of course, I did not have their identification, but they looked young. I would say in that range of what Celeste was, 13, 14, 15. Definitely they looked less than 18. And so was there anybody there for Celeste side as far as you can tell? I could not tell if there was, and there was an announcement by the family that they were not planning on coming today. What about anybody there in support of David? It's always unclear because this was a hearing that so many people went to attend.

Every single seat was taken. There were people behind the defense table that did not look like press. They did not have the press credentials. They didn't have their laptop and typing. But whether or not they were members of the public or supporters of David is unclear. And you're saying it was packed. There was a lot of media. Is this one of those cases where you think it's getting a lot of?

of attention just from people online streamers like i understand there was even a long line to get in to court today absolutely this you know here we're in los angeles it's no stranger to high profile cases and the press uh showed up there was a line to get in literally every single seat in that courtroom was taken the press cameras were lined up outside waiting for a press conference that never happened uh the prosecution decided not to speak the defense decided not to speak the defense decided not to But this is going to be heavily watched. There was actually at the very end of the hearing, a representative from the news organization, asking the judge to reconsider her denial of allowing cameras in the courtroom, reiterating

that the judges here seem to have kind of learned the lesson after the OJ case to not allow cameras, and that after so many years, perhaps the OJ case afraid of letting a cameras needs to go away. and saying how the public pays for this building and should allow cameras in, but the judge denied it. There will not be cameras allowed in this next hearing or if a trial moves forward. Wow, no cameras in the preliminary hearing. Look, I personally think that's a mistake, particularly in a case like this, since there's so much speculation, so much rumors. This is a front row to seeing what the evidence is, what evidence the prosecution believes they have. Do they have sufficient probable cause to support these charges?

I think that this is one of those cases where the public has a right to view and should's view what the evidence is. Which, by the way, let me go back to you, Dina, on this. This is both a legal question for you and a reporter question. I have been curious after I heard Nathan Hockman the other day, what is the evidence they have to prove lying in wait that he was, that he allegedly killed Celeste because she was. a witness to doing a case or an investigation that he allegedly killed her for financial gain. The basic idea here is she was going to allegedly expose him for this illegal sexual relationship, right? Did you get any sense today about what that evidence will be? No, and I'm glad you brought up that point because to me that is in a way of very strange

motive because here the prosecution is alleging that he killed her in order to, cover up the crime of his child sex abuse. But yet he kept the body in his car for months. So he did a very bad job of then disposing of the evidence, you would say. The prosecution needs to explain something like that. But what we did here today is in this digital age, there is a mountain of digital evidence. Obviously, with three grand juries,

they have quite a bit of witness testimony. They have the wiretap evidence, which we didn't know about that. And it appears they have DNA, chemical, sure, video surveillance. But that theory of the case strikes me as very strange as an attorney. And perhaps the prosecution has an explanation. I mean, the prosecution said today that, quote, we're ready to go to trial. They would be happy for the defense to waive their right to a speedy trial.

but they do have to explain that contradiction in the motive and the lack of disposing of the evidence. Let me follow up on something. We don't know for sure that her dismembered, decomposed body was in the car from April to September, right? Did you learn something different? No, we do not. It's more of that. You and I talk about a lot of true crime cases. you would, if the idea is that somebody is trying to cover up another crime and goes to such lengths as to commit murder,

you would think they would do a better job of disposing of the evidence and the murder crime. Let me ask you this. Anything about potential cooperating witnesses, did any specific names come up? You talk about the connective tissue. There have always been a lot of players that have come up in this case. case, allegations about who might have testified in front of a grand jury or a hearing. Did you hear any name, any potential cooperating witness? We heard no names whatsoever.

And in fact, the prosecution did not give a glimmer as to what happened in that grand jury saying this is secret. It could only be unsealed by a motion from the defense. Okay. Interesting for a status conference here. I'm very curious to see what happens with the preliminary hearing. Oh, before I let you go, any. idea of where the defense is going when they say he's not the cause of death do they have an idea that they're going to be introducing their own forensic expert or they're going to be casting doubt

on that perhaps she didn't die from multiple penetrating injuries that it was caused by something else or is this too early it was too early they really were focusing on basically telling the judge they didn't have enough evidence that they're defendant because he was waving his right to a speedy preliminary trial had a right to receive some evidence and they really had it received enough from the prosecution that was really what they were asking for the judge the judge being sympathetic the prosecution saying they planning on cooperate they're going to meet at the end of april 29th determine if they have enough if the preliminary hearing goes forward prosecution says they expect it to last about four to five days okay interesting all right we shall see dina dal thank you for coming in

Thank you for taking the time. Thank you for covering for us. Thanks for having me. And that's all we have for you right now here on Sidebar, everybody. Thank you so much for joining us. And as always, please subscribe on YouTube, Apple Podcast, Spotify, wherever you should get your podcast. You can also check us out on NBC's Peacock as well. If you want to follow me, X Instagram, my News Nation show, Jesse Weber Live, Monday through Friday, 11 p.m. Eastern.

I'll see you next time, everybody.