D4vd: What the Autopsy and the Timeline Actually Reveal

This is the Big Breakdown, a long look back at some of the biggest stories we're covering

for you at the Hidden Killers Podcast and True Crime Today.

This is Hidden Killers Live with Tony Ruski and Robin Drake.

Prosecutors have unsealed the autopsy of Celeste Rivas Hernandez and what it describes is

Brutal, two stab wounds to the torso, a perforated liver, her arms and legs severed, blue

plastic fragments embedded in the cut surfaces.

Her remains weighed 71 pounds after months in the trunk of a Tesla.

And in a courtroom prosecutor's reveal that David Anthony Burke's devices contain

what they called a significant amount of certain types of material that I don't want

to say on YouTube, because it will flag us immediately.

You can guess what that might involve, yeah, there's kids in it, buried inside 40 terabytes

of digital evidence, pulled from his phone, computer, and an eye cloud for months police

asked whether there was enough to prove this case.

The question now is whether the defense has any room left.

Joining me to discuss joining me in Robin Drake, Retard FBI Special Agency for the Counter

Intelligence Behavioral Analysis Program, Robins here, and also Retard FBI Special Agent

Jennifer Coffin Daffer to help us break all of this down.

Yeah, this is some pretty dark stuff guys.

Jennifer, the autopsy describes two stab wounds, one perforated Celeste liver, the other

damaging the ribs both with smooth edges from a sharp instrument.

But do these wound characteristics tell you about what took place between that girl and

somebody?

Well, it tells me a lot.

This is brutal force to penetrate a rib, brutal force going into the liver.

I have to say I was really surprised that the liver would have even been sort of intact

or that they could have made those determinations with degradation of the body that would have

happened in that front.

But this is this is violent, purposeful, no hesitation.

You know, Jen, you were one of the proponents early on that this was not an accident of

a pandemic, an exhalation, you know, like some of us, including me, I even suggested

on the show.

You know, I retracted the fact that I thought it was just stupid things happening, stupid

people doing stupid 20-year-old and teenage things escalated and there's a cover up.

But you called it early on.

What were some of the signs that you saw earlier on that said, no, no, this is much worse than

this.

It's much darker than we think it is.

The number one sign was my belief from the beginning that despite detractors that she

was dismembered.

I knew there was a way to get her in that front at 110 pounds.

I know she was founded only 70 pounds, but that was after, you know, months of, you know,

melting away.

Cucking, yeah.

Unfortunately.

So I knew from that, you do not have the capacity to literally remove at near the joints,

the arms and dismember somebody.

That is not something that someone does because of an accident ever.

So that told me right there that this was going to be something very intention.

Yeah, because even in saying this to totally agree, because even if it was a panic escalation

where you're like, oh crap, we got to get rid of the body, the amount of time to do just

what you said to take things apart like that, it's time if ever, effort and as a prefrontal

lobe is fully flooded back out again after about 20, 30 minutes, reason should start coming

into play before you're even done and then you should start making other decisions.

You caught that early, so a really good job.

Yeah, you were right 100% of the time on this one, as I think a lot of us thought, maybe

it's something not as, but you were, you called it from day one, 1000% on this, Jen.

Drugs also found in her body, a benzodiazepines and other things apparently in there saying

that there was not the cause of death, but she was only 14.

What are the, the presence of the drugs?

What does that tell you?

Anything other than she was around a lot of people that were doing things they shouldn't

be doing?

We've told me a lot, Tony, and this is why.

First of all, they said methamphetamine or possibly MDMA, you know, very uppers, very

upper, and then they describe the depressants, the benzodiazepines.

When you add those together, that is somebody that is partaking in huge, huge highs and

you quell the crash, they have to take these downers to bring it down slowly because it's

so big.

So this tells me that only 14, this is heavy, heavy, hard drugs, those benzodiazepines have

half-lifes, they don't leave you.

This tells me a pattern of really egregious drug use that would have been practiced in

and around her and that they provided for her, it's really sick.

Do you think that the drug use here, because we obviously have it in her autopsy, one has

to assume that other folks around were probably doing the same sort of things, how might that

have influenced some of the behavior here in terms of what David is accused of doing and

who knows who else was involved in this in some way, shape or form, how much do you think

drugs played a part in this, considering just how sloppy and stupid so much of this seems

to have been.

Yeah, no great question, and out of all the drugs that I've dealt with people on, there

is nothing worse than methamphetamine, nothing.

I have seen people jump from two to three story balconies to escape us when we came in

and after we did respond, by the way, they landed, moved on.

I've seen a woman who had three kids at home begging, just like my arms and just begging

me on our hands and knees to please give me some of the stash we rated.

Please, please, just out of her mind and the sexual component of methamphetamine makes people

absolutely animal, animalistic, ferocious in their sexual drive.

So you add all of this together, I'm not at all sick.

What do you think of likelihood, this is going to be only person charged or what do you

think about more, and part of that is how many people, or do you think there's people

that flip that gave this information, do you think they got it all from digital combination

and again, back to, do you think there's going to be more charges against others?

You know, back to the beginning, right, because Tony, you have covered this so well from

the beginning, I said, the digital trail will be his demise, and the reason I said that

is because he lived a life in digital, in the digital world.

I've got this great clip where he just talks about that, how he doesn't even really intersect

with people personally very much.

His life is on a computer.

And so you knew that this was coming, at least I believed it would be coming.

And so because of that, it's going to reduce, right, the people likely maybe charged and

involved at least with the sexual exploitation images, I'll say it that way, on the computer.

But when it comes to what happened here, I promise you, he did not do this alone, right?

His dismemberment just didn't happen on a whim.

Other people were there, other people knew about it.

Those people are definitely in jeopardy for being charged.

And they're going to take the lowest hanging fruit in terms of who they let cooperate.

One of the pieces of fruit that they're trying to, I probably identify right now, probably

honestly already have, would be the people who have their DNA on the bag that she was

in in the frunk or the bags that she was in in the frunk.

I know they swabbed them, they have not revealed what they found or anything of that nature.

But if it's as sloppy as some of these other pieces, I've been one would guess they may

find DNA there.

If they do find DNA there and they match it to someone, maybe it's David, maybe it's

somebody else.

Those sort of, I guess, be the low hanging fruit that could tell the story of what happened

here.

And maybe there'll be the ones that are still walking free at some point.

I mean, in a case like this, where do you think this goes?

Is there something where they're going to give immunity to some people, even though they

were involved with some pretty dark stuff or is it going to come with strings of, yeah,

you're not going to go away for the rest of your life, but you're going to get something

here and you need to testify or you're getting the rest of your life.

Where do you think that's going to fall for any other folks who may be in the ecosystem

that have some responsibility here, either of the act of the actual death itself or in

the covering up of the act?

Well, the number one thing they're going to look at, meaning law enforcement and investigators

is who can they go after that had knowledge, but maybe didn't even participate?

You know, and in other words, for them to give them the roadmap, how did this all

happen?

What was the, you know, we know the likely motive now.

We've heard that out of their mouths, but how did it happen?

How did she get so angry that she was going to go to authorities?

What was fired to get them if it happens to be in San Bernardino County, which seems

likely?

How did this all come together?

What, how big and egregious was the plan?

So Tony, they will start with the people that have the least amount of exposure in terms

of actually being there.

And if you get anybody that fills those shoes, then I think they will go for somebody

that was there, but no way do they get full immunity.

That's what I believe.

Yeah.

You know, we talked a lot the other day, not just on this case, which so many cases that

we've been covering lately, parents, you know, we're not necessarily her parents, which,

you know, we're covering, but his parents, do you think there's going to be any kind of

culpability with their involvement, not involvement or just the fact that there seems to be enough

of a connection, especially when shifting things to their names after arrests and things

like that.

Well, you know, this is the thing.

The parents were in Texas.

I don't think the parents were intimately at all involved in his life once you left.

You know, this is the thing about David that is different from a lot of criminals that

he, if he's guilty of this is very much so criminal, but he, he isn't from the normal

demographic, right?

He didn't grow up poor.

He didn't grow up disadvantaged.

He didn't grow up in a drug home.

He grew up in quite the opposite of that.

And so I find it very interesting, right, that no matter how he was raised and educated,

he was very educated.

I don't know if you've ever heard him speaky.

He actually is a very intellectual speaker, his songwriting, why it's, well, it's very dark.

It's also very thoughtful, meaning it's not just, you know, spot jumped over the fence.

It's actually pretty deep.

It's not, it's not money bitches, money bitches, money bitches, you see, and, you know, it

isn't.

I mean, there is some depth to it.

I mean, there really is, but, but, yeah, you're exactly right.

I'm sorry.

Go ahead.

I got to throw that in.

Spot jumped over the fence is so bad.

Thank you for chiming in with the point I'm trying to get.

Spot jumped over the fence to get his money and bitches, yo.

You know, and, and to that, what I'm curious about, you know, so, I, because you've covered

some of these cases with so many dark people, so many dark themes, and he was so young,

and to both your points, you know, he's got this, the side to him that is a deep thinker

and deep intellectual, but so much dark themes, do you think, Jen, that that's a nature

and nurture coming together for all those dark themes and how they manifested?

You know, I've been convinced over the years of working these kinds of cases and studying

these kinds of cases that there are some people that are truly just bad.

There's just some, you know, it's so that would be the nature argument, right?

There's some just no matter how they're brought up, no matter how love they are, just

bad.

But I think greater majority aren't, and they're made, they're created into the monsters

they become.

That's the huge majority of, at least what I've seen.

In this one, by all accounts, you know, it was a very normal, if not above, much above

normal upbringing, right?

Kind of like over her, because of the big house, he had a mother who absolutely adored

him, a father who worked hard, sisters who were very accomplished, I think he's just a

bad seed.

Well, you look at the recipe here.

You got someone who's in his early 20s, late teens when the stuff is going on, someone

who, you know, buy these sort of accounts, you know, he suddenly has this money, suddenly

has this attention, suddenly has this fame, starts believing his own shit is what I'm kind

of seeing here, almost, you know, I mean, his videos, you know, they're, they're deep

quote unquote, and his music is a bit deeper than the average.

But I'm just wondering if that played into it, if it ended up becoming this, this perfect

storm of, he's at that age where they're already thinking, you know, I'm unstoppable.

You start to believe some of your own bullshit, especially if you're being fetted by the people

around you.

And then you mix a bunch of drugs into that equation.

And I'm just wondering how much of that recipe is what created this where once everybody's

a little more sober and a little more older and they look back going, who the fuck was

that?

And I mean, I wonder if David's doing that about himself now that maybe he's had some

time to, to sober up and see what was going on at that moment in his life.

I don't know.

I'm just wondering how much of, of, now that it's a defense, but how much of the reasoning

here we're going to hear of drugs made me do it.

And the rest is, you know, part of the recipe at that perfect storm point in life.

Before you chime in on that, Jen, is I definitely want that.

I want to add to this, though, I don't think we should forget, though, because I totally

think all those things are relevant, Tony.

She was 11.

She remember, she was targeted as an underage girl as well.

And so what came first here, the drugs or that?

So in other words, a chicken or the egg on this one.

So I think, I think his deviant mind was already potentially brewing before all this

as well.

And that's what I want to add into your question for Jen.

Oh, yeah.

Well, my answer is strongly Alchem's razor.

This is a child pervert, predator, lovely girls, absolutely.

That is, that is the seed.

That's the problem.

The problem isn't drugs.

The problem isn't music.

The problem isn't his culture.

The problem is computer.

The problem was, and this is how I was pointed out, for people who are heterosexual and

attracted to people who are adults, you know, that are your same age, whenever, in

you like 15-year-olds, as opposed to a 15-year-old that likes three-year-olds, right?

For what age, and you like these little ones?

Yeah.

You can never not like little ones, okay?

Not little ones is never going to excite you, and does that make sense?

So once you like that, then the normal, somebody your own age, that is never going to thrill

you.

That's never going to provide what you're looking for.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, because to that, I think, and is this what you're saying, too, Jen, is like he

started broken because of his love of, of underage, and then all these other things were

a carousine on that fire.

Exactly.

I agree.

I agree.

Broken, torn, broken, and then all of this happened because of that.

Remember, she was going to knock him out.

Yeah.

It gave him the tools to be worse.

Well, it's so, I mean, and the stupidity here was so much of it is just mind-boggling.

I mean, he's, he clearly doesn't think, and there's anything wrong with this, or that

he's invincible enough that no one's ever going to catch him with what he's doing, with

this significant amount of CSAM material that they found on his device.

I'm going to guess a lot of it's her, but who knows?

I don't know the answer to that.

And his circle, and his entourage, too.

I'm thinking about it.

He's got a tight circle of people.

So this is where, you know, Jen's saying, you know, I'm just curious because, you know,

did they make the charges to flush more out, or did they get the charges because some

already flipped?

But this whole group seemed to think this was okay.

Yeah.

It's, this is going to be, and that's where the drugs come in, though.

That's what I will agree with you that that haze covers over, and now all of a sudden,

it's seemingly okay in their mind.

And if it's not, I think I'll just take another hit of meth.

And just keep going, you know, that creepy, dark, this is, this is one of the worst ones

we've covered.

Yeah.

I mean, it went from being like, maybe this isn't horrible to like, oh my God, this is

one of the worst we've heard about.

Yeah.

Maybe it's an accident to, oh my God, you're the worst ever.

Yeah.

I mean, it's, it's, yeah.

Your thoughts in the comments section on Substack in YouTube on this segment.

We'd love for you to weigh in and we'll continue that conversation there.

David Anthony Burke allegedly took the life of a 14 year old girl on April 20, 30, 2025,

two days later.

He released his debut album, performed at concerts, launched a world tour, played a show in

Minneapolis.

Minneapolis.

And yes, that's a reference to, I'm going to take you on an escapade.

The same night Celeste remains were identified in his car.

And for seven months, he walked free while a family in Lake Elsinore waited for answers

about their daughter.

This system actively kept from her Jennifer Kaufendaffer retired FBI special agent joining

myself and Robin Drake retired FBI special agent to help break down the, the new developments

in this case.

Jen prosecutors are alleging that Burke killed Celeste in April 23, dropped his album two

days later and then launched the world tour, performing for crowds while her body was

allegedly in his car.

Well, that shows quite a way of compartmentalizing information.

Does it not?

How do you think that will play in front of a jury of, well, you just did all this and

now you're on stage and living it up?

I'm wondering if concert footage may come into play here just to kind of show the vast

difference in reality of what's going on in life and how he's performing it.

You know, I just have to say he didn't care.

Yeah.

And this is the thing.

It's so easy to look from our lens and be normal, right?

And we just, my God.

But that isn't his lens.

This was okay.

And he did not care a rat's butt about her just meant that no one did.

There's not one critical thinker in there.

Just not just the horrendous act, the nature of the act, the dismemberment, but putting

them in a Tesla under your name and leaving it.

I mean, so have you ever seen another case in where there wasn't a plan for next?

I mean, what was a plan?

Leave her there until she completely evaporates.

I mean, what the?

It makes no sense.

Most of them are like that.

Most of them are like that.

They have this great idea that they're going to take off the person that is challenging

them in some way.

It's not going to be good for them to be alive or that they're mad at or whatever.

And they always sort of forget the next steps.

Like, okay, crap, we've got a body which we always talk about this.

The hardest thing after a murder is what in the world am I going to do with the body?

That's the biggest problem.

How am I going to pick it up?

How am I going to put it?

How am I going to get rid of it?

And I tell you, they didn't, I don't believe necessarily dismembered because of the pleasure

it brought, although it might believe me.

I think it could have brought a pleasure that they did it because they needed her to fit

that front.

And that's about 80% of why dismemberments occur.

But what?

Oh, go ahead, Tony.

What about this part of it, though?

Maybe Rob and you're going here, too?

I don't know.

The fingers.

The fingers.

That was good.

It's exactly my question.

Nobody needs to cut the fingers to fit her in the frunk.

What the hell is that?

And an eyeball, too, for good measure.

Oh, I didn't know.

I didn't know.

Yeah, there's an eyeball, too.

Yeah, I read that after we were talking yesterday.

Like what?

That's not to fit in the frunk.

No.

You've seen trophies or something else.

What?

What's on that finger?

Yeah.

What is it?

A souvenir?

Is that what we're thinking this might be here?

Or is it something I don't, I'm almost like,

I get the souvenir thing.

And we've seen that obviously it's a sign

in so many of these killers.

But is it a souvenir?

Or is he, again, I just kind of keep going back

to this weird feeling of like, is he believing

his own grandiosity, his own myth, his own aura

of being this very dark artist?

And then somehow he's kind of like live in life.

And this is part of what's going on in life.

And he's using her as a prop to truly

live the dark macabre lifestyle in a way

that goes far beyond a music video.

And using her for his own weird twisted art.

Mark Fry had an interesting thing too,

the right there.

One eye illuminati, interesting.

Well, I would say this, just from experience, was it this?

Don't look at me.

And I'm not even kidding you.

Like, control, you're not looking at me.

And the finger, to me, those fingers

had the, you know, the tattooing messages that they match.

And I think it's like, this is done.

That's what I think.

So, so yeah, so here's an interesting connection

between the two.

So take the eye, you can't look at me.

So these are potentially controlling her and after

because you can't look at me and you can't silence me.

Well, that's just creepy.

And yeah, I'm also wondering if the tattoo,

if part of the thought process was, that's a,

it's a definitive mark on her that if the game plan was

eventually we're going to get this body out of this frunk

and dump it somewhere.

If they ever find it, you know, all a human,

removing marking tattoos and things of that nature.

I'm wondering if some of the idiotic thought process here

was, well, that finger has the tattoo on it.

The same way David's does, I want to get rid of that

because that will be an identifiable characteristic to her.

And hopefully, when they find her, they can't identify her.

I'm wondering if that might be the finger answer.

The eye makes it even creepier.

And everything you guys said, you're going to get me nightmares.

But I mean, what do you think?

Well, I'd say that was part of it as well.

Look, I'm a very, as you know, I always say it.

I've said it once already, Occam's razor.

People typically have reasons for doing something

that makes sense to them and can make sense to the rest of us.

But this is, we just add in this dark component.

And let's also, I mean, to me, what I see

is the laziness of this, right?

The lazy, you know, why couldn't they take all these other steps

and it's combined with drug usage, heavy marijuana usage,

which my opinion with some that heavily use marijuana

like this, like an addict like this,

is that they are exceedingly lazy in terms of unmotivated.

So it doesn't just apply to whether they're

going to do the dishes or whether they're

going to clean their room, which if you've looked at pictures

of all of that with him, you'll see my point here.

It also applies to committing crimes.

Those same people, lazy and harmful.

So I think there's a lot of little components here.

Well, it's almost like selective motivations.

It's not like it's nothing to chop somebody up like this.

That's some work.

But it's, the dishes is a good example where it's like,

you just can't follow through enough, Kenya.

Like you get so far and it's like good enough.

And in a really sick way, yes, it probably applies

to the dishes and it also applies here.

It's the same overall motivation that one would have

for either way.

And I'm guessing that certainly is a big component here.

Let's talk about what we are hearing from Celeste

parents right now.

Celeste parents have made some statements.

They've described Friday movie nights and a loving daughter.

The record shows 11 police calls in 14 months,

three missing persons reports in a child,

not enrolled in school for a year.

Also, Celeste told us she loved us.

I thought that was a weird way of expressing it.

And not we loved her.

But call me crazy.

It's interesting.

I can't imagine going through what the hell they're going through.

But I still feel like, come on.

I got a daughter at the same age.

I'm not like, oh, her boyfriend is 19s picking her up.

His name's David.

I have no idea where she's going, but I'm cool with it.

There seem to be a lot of just like you run free and do whatever

you want to do going on here.

And not a lot of shining the spotlight over there,

because there's a reason she ran away this many times.

This is not necessarily just a happy, healthy girl

and a happy, healthy environment to say the least in my opinion.

This is somebody that is completely

there are zero parameters for her and me.

The one piece of footage that I saw that really enlighten me

as to who this little girl was.

And I don't know if you've seen it,

but there's this footage that she is in this massive F-bomb fight.

Yeah.

That's really insight to her.

She is not acting like, I think she was 13 then.

She might have been 14.

Actually, whatever, 13, 14 is not like any other 13, 14.

I mean, she was acting like a whatever, a 30-year-old angry

on the same level as an adult type thing.

I'm not mentioning her.

I am saying, how did this little girl lose being a little girl

and turn into what I heard on that tape and her actions?

How was all of this?

How are you literally sitting there doing methamphetamine

and benzos?

How is that happened?

And I'm with you, Tony.

These parents have culpability.

Yeah, it's interesting.

The, we covered this the other day.

And it was, I really think that look of maturity

comes from problem-solving skill set

that she got earlier in life to make herself feel safe

and being in control of her own life.

The problem solve these things that typically her age

doesn't have to do.

And so the question I think really comes up to

when we're talking about the parents

was, and this would pop to my mind when you said

a few seconds ago, Tony, was, was she running away from that

or was she running to the other?

Or was a combination of both?

Because if she's such, if she's got so enamored with him

and she's in such control of her own life

because there's zero parameters or guardrails put

on the other side, where she's much running away

as she's running to, I don't know,

it's an interesting balance to think of.

How much do you think that element of her,

I mean, the way you just described her,

if you didn't know her age and you saw that video,

I wouldn't have guessed that was a 13-year-old.

I would have thought 19, 2021.

I mean, does that in fact play to the advantage

of the defense of not necessarily David,

but to those around that weren't so intimately

allegedly close to her, but in the circle that all said,

we thought she was a 19-year-old college student at USC,

turns out she's a 13-year-old seventh grader

from Lake Elsonar.

I mean, quite a stark difference,

but it's about the way she carried herself.

Yeah, it depends on how long they knew her,

how long they were exposed to her,

what David told them about her,

what they might have online.

I mean, this was an online community too,

although I understand that you're talking about

the actual real-life bodies that were involved in the entourage.

It depends on all of that, Tony.

I still think when you look at her not made up,

dress down, man, that little face,

she's just 12-year-old.

Healthy people ask, man.

I mean, as we said, when you are around people

of notoriety of celebrity and they're healthy,

in a sense of they're very aware of their surroundings

and the impact of their choices

and who they surround themselves with,

impacts them their way of life and their own relationships,

they get hyper-critical and very, very careful about what they do,

who they associate with, ages, all these things,

not just them as individuals,

but they're a circle that is really there

to protect them from being stupid

or having or opportunistic people

that are trying to take advantage of them for gain.

I mean, because these people are,

they're confronted with people that are going to use their age

or use a picture that they can take off hand

with someone to try to blackmail them potentially.

So they, when you're dealing with real celebrities

that have that awareness

and have that kind of protective sheet around them,

they do diligence to make sure that they're not exposing themselves

the things that could undermine them just like this did.

Regardless of the actions he wound up taking

or as accused of taking,

they do a lot of due diligence to make sure

that especially when you're dealing with this age group.

I mean, this is like, it's selective stupidity.

It is.

I mean, and depending on what you knew of her or how you saw her,

I mean, if you just saw that video like you were talking about,

you don't really see her very well.

You just hear this voice

and it does not appear to be a 13-year-old,

but then you do see pictures,

everyone go, yeah, she is 13.

It's probably is who took in the information,

what information they took in and how they processed

and what was being pitched to them by people they trusted.

And I'm gonna guess there's several people in this group

in this circle that probably did think she was older.

There's probably some that knew the secret

and didn't want to ask any more questions

because the hand that fed them would be the hand you're questioning

and when people get into these sort of circles with celebrities

and they become part of the entourage

and there's an incentive not to ask questions,

well, people shut the F up pretty quick.

And to Jen's point, somewhere in there,

lies a low-hanging fruit that they're gonna go for.

Yeah, it's a horrible, horrible case.

Your thoughts in the comment section on Substack and YouTube,

we'd love for you to weigh in.

Want more on this case and others?

Then press subscribe now

and don't miss a moment of true crime coverage

from Tony Brusky and the Hidden Killer's podcast.