Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images
On September 8, officials in Los Angeles discovered the decomposed body of 15-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez in the trunk of an impounded Tesla registered to singer and songwriter known as d4vd, according to police reports. In the weeks since, the details around the homicide have sparked a tide of public intrigue as normal people and streamers with millions of followers like Adin Ross alike pour over limited factual details and circulating unverified material. Law enforcement has not named a suspect at press time, and questions remain unanswered. Representatives for d4vd have said he is cooperating with the investigation.
With so many theories swirling, we hopped on the phone with Michael J. Alber, Esq, a criminal lawyer in New York City, to get his perspective on the knottiest details of the case and what else needs to be answered.
The FADER: Let’s discuss what I think is the biggest question people have right now: why no one hasn’t been charged or taken into custody yet.
Michael J. Alber: Having a body in a car in and of itself is not going to be enough to have somebody accused of and have a murder case proven. There’s a key query of “Who did it?” and “How did it happen?” In a case like this, to track down the “Who did it?” part, there’s going to be cell phone data, you’re going to see exactly where the parties’ locations were, you’ll see the circumstances leading up to where the deceased is. I understand that the car may have been sitting for a while, and that’s obviously a concern. It appears as though the body may have been dead for a long time, so that’s gonna be problematic in tracing the chain of events as well. Forensics are gonna be extensive in a case like this.
Why hasn’t anyone been named a suspect?
No homicide detective wants to be cross-examined about a rush to judgment in a case because saying somebody is a suspect is… the nomenclature associated with it has such a negative connotation. I think [it] brings with it a certain prejudice, and if there’s ultimately that rush to judgment and [someone is] charged, [their defense team] would say “You were labeling them before you even had sufficient evidence to label them.”
On the flip side of it, as you’ve seen in other national news stories, the FBI was naming somebody a suspect pretty quickly and then releasing them moments thereafter in a method of transparency. There’s different philosophies, but I can understand the Los Angeles Police Department’s hesitation in labeling [anyone] as a suspect publicly, at least without more information to do so because of negative nomenclature.
Since the news broke and the body was found and police identified the victim as being Celeste Rivas Hernandez, a plethora of unverified material has surfaced online. Are these materials admissible in a court of law?
It can be if the government can issue a connection and develop a storyline for this murder as to what’s happened. They can use information provided it’s relevant to motive and intent, anything that helps the jury understand elements of a crime.
[On] September 17th, detectives with the LAPD’s robbery Homicide Division served a search warrant on d4vd’s rental home located not far from where the Tesla was parked. That means [there was] reasonable cause to believe that contraband might be in that house and/or evidence of crime is in that house because those warrants are going to have to be articulated with information that is specific enough to be able to do that.
Do you think the police are paying attention to these screenshots and these song snippets?
I think law enforcement absolutely will pay attention to that. I think anything in the public domain as part of their investigation, given the profile of the case, will be reviewed.
What about lyrics in songs?
I had a case in the Eastern District of New York, a federal case that went to trial, and the government used lyrics from a rapper at trial. Lyrics in a case can be deemed to be party-opponent statements. Just because they are lyrics in and of itself does not preclude them from being entered into evidence in any case.
The only statement that d4vd’s team has released is that he is aware of the investigation and that he’s cooperating with law enforcement. What do you interpret that to actually mean?
That’s great that he’s cooperating, but if he’s getting sound legal advice, he should not be making statements to anybody, anywhere, anytime, any place. I’m sure d4vd has attorneys that are not having him speak, but are in fact cooperating with law enforcement by assisting to the extent that they can without incriminating d4vd. d4vd could be innocent, completely without fault, but any defense lawyer worth their salt should be making a very careful determination as to how he’s presented and what is specifically said on his behalf.
Back to the outsized public reaction: how is this impacting the case? Do you think it’s affecting how officials are releasing information? It’s been about 3 weeks and there’s been very little new information.
Given the profile and circumstances of the case, I think LAPD is probably being very cautious as to how the circumstances are being released to the public. The reason why is because some law enforcement official doesn’t want to get cross-examined about making a statement that’s completely wrong. At present, while it might look bad, you have a dead body in a car that’s registered to somebody who’s doing prominent work in the singing world, he should be afforded the presumption of innocence. And all these things coming out could taint the jury pool in a case like this. I think his attorneys, his publicists, they [need to] do a good job of maintaining his image as just that, a rapper, humble, caring, that is not related to this homicide.
His manager recently made a statement.
His manager never should have made a comment. I mean, look, clearly there’s something very tragic that happened here. And in this type of circumstance he should not be having managers make comments at all. The manager is denying receiving an email that’ll be proven or not proven, whether the email is sent and whether or not it’s an email address connected to the manager, which ultimately could undermine anybody around d4vd.
As someone who’s been following this case, what questions do you want answered?
The timeline of where Ms. Celeste Rivas was. I read from the news that she had some issues in her own life and upbringing and that she had previously, I believe, gone missing. I think that’s something that should be looked into more. I would like to know the fruits of the September 17th raid, which we’re not going to find out. Several bags of evidence were seized from the home. That’s going to be telling. I think the relationship, and what the extent of it was, [will likely be examined]: what others may have said about it, what she may have told her friends. I think that’s a very key aspect.
