Some people think David did it. Here he is with this underage girl. Body is in his car. But he would have to be a psychopath. Hey, he's not even psycho. He's psychopaths are not that stupid. Welcome to the Two Angry Men podcast. Mark, the biggest story in the TMZ universe right now is David, the singer, um, who had a Tesla or who has one and the body of this girl, a 14-year-old girl, Celeste Rivas, was found in the trunk. Uh, the car was parked on a busy residential street. It was towed. The towyard found the body and uh the LAPD is in the middle of this wild investigation. We have a lot of information. I have been waiting all week to talk to you. I want to throw things at you and get your take on.
Please do. Are you going to start with the fact that the medical examiner in LA has not uh as normal because they haven't done the talk screen yet, but hasn't released a full report at this point. Here's why I'm not really surprised. Yeah. TMZ is turning 20 next month. In the 20 years we've done it, I cannot think of a single case where the LAPD and the medical examiner and other law enforcement agencies in Riverside and other places have played things as close to the vest as they have in this case. Um, and I will tell you, and in fact, let me just tell you a quick story before we get into the evidence because we have a lot now. The way this came about is the they found the body in the trunk um and it was so badly decomposed, possibly cut up.
That's unclear. Um to the point where they couldn't even tell if it was a man or a woman. We got a tip. The police just said that the victim had a tattoo on the right index finger that said shh dot dot dot dot. We got a tip that it was this girl, Celeste Rivas. We got in touch with her mother and we talked to the mother who said, um, yes, the tattoo was red and that she had a boyfriend named David. And we're thinking, wait a minute, the car is registered to David. So, I called the LAPD. I called robbery homicide. And I called them to give them her number and her name so that maybe this was the girl. And they didn't return my call. And I thought, wait, when did you call them? What date? It was be it was around September 5th when the when this all came out before they knew who she was.
All they said was, "We're trying to figure out who it is." And I thought, "Well, maybe it's her." So I called LAPD and I think what they thought was I was just trying to get information. So they didn't call me back. So I called him the next day and I and and and this is no disparagement um to robbery homicide, but they were annoyed that I was even calling and I said, "Guys, I want to give you something." And I told them and when I said that she had the tattoo and it was red, I could hear something because they hadn't released that it was red. And I just that it was red yet. And I just And by the way, what at what point since September 5th, because you mentioned something that's fascinating to me, it's been reported that the uh body was dismembered.
It's been reported that it was in there for a while. I don't believe uh based on what I've seen so far that you can make a definitive uh or draw definitive conclusion at this point absence some pathologist going in there and actually trying to discern the whether it's a dismemberment or it's just part of the decomposition process. You know, I was having that exact discussion with somebody five minutes ago. So I I hear you. So look, so you know, we left the information. We gave them the information and um that was the last we heard of them. They have been so locked down in such an unusual way. And I'm just going to say it that we Why do you attribute that to I don't know. We have sources that normally are available to us. Nobody's available. I mean, it's I was I was going to say, don't take this the wrong way, but TMZ, as you mentioned, is almost 20 years old or is 20 years old.
You've had a very robust relationship with the LAPD over those 20 years. So, it is strange for me at least based on what I've seen over the years that they have clammed up over this. And that's why I'm asking, what's your gut on that? Yeah, my gut. Look, okay, here, let me lay it out on what we have and then we can talk about it because I I'm telling you a lot of people think David is the guy who did this and I know that and there is evidence I think that points that way, but I think there's evidence that points in a different way too. So, let me tell you what we know.
So, this so David owned the car and the body was found in the car. We also know from people we've spoken with and photographs we have that there is a real connection between David who was 20 and Celeste who was 14 when she died and that we have talked to people who were around them went to parties with them and that they assumed they were boyfriend girlfriend. Um Celeste who had run away from home um presented herself like she was 18 or 19. She had multiple fake IDs and the people at the various parties when they found out she was the victim they were stunned. They thought my god they she had apparently passed hersel herself off as being a USC student. So they thought she was an adult. They couldn't believe that she was 14 years old. So there is that. Can I ask a question? Did you ask the people who were at the parties who claimed to know her whether or not she was ingesting or doing any substances that they saw? Nobody is saying anything like that yet.
But boy, my head is where your head is there, too, because that's an alternate theory to murder for sure. Um, correct. And that's that's something before everybody jumps all the way to the the the obvious. I and I say that not disparagingly, but it's you have to you have to consider number one the the conclusion and then we've got to go backwards and see what what else could have and and realistically may have happened. Spoken like a defense lawyer. Well, I mean, you know, look, defense lawyers generally are early money on a lot of things, so I'll leave it at that. Okay, I get it. So, okay. So, we also have pictures of David the singer um in Lake Elsenor um a six-inute walk from the family house. So, there's a real connection there. And and and the other thing is that, you know, David didn't hide this. you know, he's dating a 14-year-old, maybe a 13-year-old, and I think that's true, a 13-year-old as well, because she this didn't just start.
She disappeared first in January of 2024. The police found her a month later in Hollywood, which happens to be the area where David lives, and they brought her back home, and then in March, um, she disappears again, and the family never saw her. That's 2024. She was 13. So, so all of that is circumstantial that they knew each other along with song titles along with the obvious fact that she's that her body and her remains are in his trunk. My question is, is the lawyer who represents David denying that there was a connection or that they knew each other because that to me is a that's a heavy lift.
No, no statement on that. Uh there's not talking I they're not denying it and they can't deny it. I mean, we have photographic evidence. We have video. So they definitely knew each other. So there's that's not an issue. They definitely knew each other and they presented his boyfriend and girlfriend to a lot of people. So you've got that. And now this is where it just gets bizarre. So you have this situation where David goes on tour in early August, right? And the the body is found September 5th. So, you know, you would think, well, it couldn't have been David, but the fact is he was performing around this area, so maybe he came back.
But what we thought was this car was just sitting there, and after 3 days, you know, it's an abandoned car, and you can call the police. Well, we now find out that this car was sitting there August 26th and clearly because it would have had been ticketed twice, it must have been sometime before August 26th that it was placed there. And that means for at least two weeks and probably more that car was sitting on Dohini Drive um abandoned at for somebody to tow and find. So what they I I would imagine what they're doing. Number one, they have canvased all surveillance cameras in the area so that they can try to pinpoint when that car was parked there. Uh it's amazing how robust surveillance cameras nor cameras themselves are in the society we live in. So they've done that. They're going to see if they can determine who was driving that car when it gets there.
They've already I guarantee you obtained the cell phone records. If she had a mobile phone, if she even if she had a burner phone, if they found that they've got his cell phone records. So they're going to be able to triangulate roughly where he was when and what time. And then they've also got the me taking a look at the remains in trying to figure out and this is really where it's a difficult task because of temperature because of where it was.
Um and the remains they're going to try to pinpoint a date uh or a rough time period of death. cause of death is going to be as difficult if not more difficult than that as well. All right now a couple of other things there that they are getting um and I think this is going to be critical. Teslas have cameras all over and that they have clearly subpoenaed Tesla to get all of the video and photo and any photographs, but certainly video. They should be able to see who placed the body in the Tesla.
That to me is going to be the smoking gun that will lead them not necessarily to who killed her, if she was killed at all. You again, she may have died of a drug overdose for all we know. But they're gonna see who put her in that Tesla. My guess is they've already gotten that. Um I would think Tesla's already agree. I think I think I I don't know what kind of robust uh wall that they've got in terms of records, but I guarantee you that they have few things you can guarantee in life, but they they've got uh surveillance or internal uh video that shows who put her in. And by the way, that also gives you the date of the placement in the trunk, what kind of condition the person was, at least that you can see from the video. It does not necessarily tell you time of death. And by the way, if there was if it appears from the video that this was somebody who was placed in there that was unconscious or may have already passed away, all that will do is at least give you an outer limit of time to kind of reverse engineer the time of death.
Yeah. Now, the one other thing that they're getting, um, his manager from Innercope rented that house, which was very close to where the car was found. And, um, that house has lots and lots of security cameras outside. I know the police wanted to get it. We found out that the owner of the house when he leased it told the tenant, "You are in control of the security cameras." The owner had no access. because the owner didn't want to look like he was snooping on them. So the whether the tenants agree or not, they are clearly so have already subpoenaed the security company because that's going to be really relevant. You know when you know was she in that house? I mean they've done a search of the house. They seem to think so because they did a luminal test in the house. So those security cameras may show somebody taking a body out of the house and putting it in the Tesla. So those two things to me are going to be really critical. Now a lot of people think and by the way they probably already have.
By the way, since they did the search of the house, they've already got search warrants or they've got a judge there who's made probable cause determinations. They have clearly done a search warrant for the security company. I I would be shocked if they didn't already have the internal cameras and depending on what kind of a security system it is, various views and things of that nature. So, they're building a timeline. Okay. which also which also is I think speaks to before everybody jumps on the he must be guilty of murder or that this was a murder.
There is a telltale sign here that something does not fit in the fact that he right because otherwise they would have arrested first because they would have had something that to your point is a smoking gun or kind of an irrefutable uh let let him explain his way out of it piece of evidence. Yeah. Um, I kind of see this slightly differently that Tell me. So, some people think David did it. I mean, here he is with her with this underage girl.
Body is in his car. Um, it just smells. But if he would have to be so the dumbest guy on the planet, a psychopath that Oh, I'm gonna He's not even psycho. Psychopaths are not that stupid. You put the body in your car. I mean, you put the body in your car and then you go on tour knowing I lived on that on Dhini Drive. I lived there. I know the way that works. I lived there for 10 years and they have street cleaners that come and I'm sure that the reason they ticketed them because I know the area is when the street cleaner comes you're supposed to move your car and if they don't they ticket you. and they had two tickets on the car. So, they all know the drill there. So, he's leaving the car with a body inside, going on tour for a month, and thinking, "What? Eventually, yeah, I guess they'll find the body, you know." No.
No. It doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense. So, no. I And it's It also It also makes very I mean, somebody's going to have to figure out at least have a coherent theory. If it was not him, then who? And that's I'm sure what law enforcement is is kind of drilling down on. And when I say that, I mean, somebody would have had to have access to that car. somebody would have had access to the lock on that car and somebody who placed it in there, even if they're in some kind of disguise because they're aware of the fact that Tesla has a uh a system that would pick them up. They still would have to How is that going to throw anybody off the trail unless there is some I mean, you can make a couple of arguments. You can say, "Look, he panicked. He, you know, she oded. She was underage. He thought, "Oh my god, this comes out. I'm toast. I mean, I was with an underage girl. I should have known better." Blah, blah, blah.
She was a runaway. I should have known that. I He has a million different thoughts that are going through his head. And then panics and puts in the car. But why? I mean, that that's going to come right back to him. That's going to circle. I mean, you could not get a more flashing come arrest me sign than putting somebody that you are involved with in the trunk of your car. And if she was not already deceased and then and that causes the death, that doesn't solve anything for you. No. And you know, some additional facts here. I don't know whether Celeste did drugs, drank. I know she had fake IDs and was going to clubs where you had to be 18. But I can tell you something about that house that David was living in because I know a lot about it. It is a party house.
Wait, how do you know about this house? Because I've talked to a bunch of neighbors and I've talked to people connected to the house. I have a lot of information on this house. This is a party house. This was a major How much was this house being rented for? leased out. I want to say 20,000 a month is my recollection. I think that's right. But and then the landlord himself or herself is basically saying here's the uh the code or the keys to the crown jewels which is the security camera because I don't want to kind of a deliberate indifference. I don't want to be the one who's uh who's responsible for what's going on there. And the person who signed the lease was an his manager at Innercope. So, I am told this was a big big party house. Neighbors were complaining all the time. As recently as I think a day or two before the body was found, they were having a big party there playing Taylor Swift music on a Sunday night and I talked to neighbors who were pissed off because it was really, really loud.
So, this is a party house. So, do we know if the neighbors had called either 911 or the police and if the police had responded before and taken names or field identification cards or told them to turn down the music, which often happens on a 415 disturbing the piece kind of a give them a warning and then just make a notation under the LAPD protocol. All I know is they called the security company that handled the area. I don't know if they call police. Um, but it was a noisy house with a lot of people. And look, your theory that what if she ODed? And again, we don't know. But what if we don't know and I let I just think there are more innocent explanations here than the one that everybody's jumping to.
So that's why I want to raise it. So let me let me give you a scenario. She was at this house a lot. And what if she became friends with people there? And what if she was there after David left to go on tour and she was at one of the parties and something bad happened with sub with a substance and it wasn't David, but it was somebody else and it became a Keystone Cops kind of how do we deal with this? And it wasn't David, but it was somebody that gave her something that cost her her life. It may have been I don't know. Well, it may have been fentanyl. And by the way, there are there are prosecutions. I've got I've got one right now where if you're the person who furnishes there, it's very highprofile in terms of being prosecuted for a subsequent death. And by the way, M. Miller, uh, Matthew Perry. Yeah. And by the way, also it also gives you at least some kind of clarity on this idea of how stupid would he have to be to have put the body in his own car.
Now, if he's left and he's on tour and somebody is there at the house and you know, something horrible happens, what better way to kind of deflect from you than to dump it into his car, go park the car, and say they'll they'll focus on him and I I'll be scott free. Yeah. Yeah. Well, let me let me put that on steroids for a second. He writes a song called romantic homicide. He writes a song about an obsession with a girl named Celeste. He is dating this 14-year-old girl and the body ends up in the trunk. So the other way of looking at it is maybe whether it was murder, a drug overdose, somebody could have said, "I don't want this to be me, but I can frame him because of all those things. People are going to jump to the conclusion everybody's jumping to. It's got to be David." So what better way than to put the body in the car.
You know, somebody's not thinking straight and they're thinking that's going to make it look like he did it, which to me points in the opposite direction, but a lot of people would say, "Oh, it's got to be him then." So, somebody who is inclined to frame David, that's what you would do. I don't even know that you have to go to the point of saying they're going to frame. You just want to get you want to get suspicion off of you. I guess it the natural um consequence of is that they're going to focus on him. But it does make a lot more sense to me that something happened. Somebody was at the house who had access to the car.
I mean, you would think that if you got access to the house, you would have access to the car. Can I stop you for just a sec? Can I stop you for a second? Sure. I spoke to somebody early on who is in the middle of all of this who said a lot of people had access to that car.
Yeah. Well, that would make sense, right? I would assume that the people who had access to the car had access to the house and but which fits in with what you have at least developed, which is there was a party house. What does a party house mean? It means that there's a lot of activity, people coming and going. How many times you've seen police reports or anything else about houses, especially in this location, in that geographic area where somebody is renting it? I mean, you've got you've covered the stories.
I've defended the cases where these houses or there's certain houses, whether you call them a party house or flop house or whatever you want to call it, that people are coming and going as kind of a safe refuge and the neighbors are going crazy. Yeah, absolutely. Okay. I I've been I've been waiting for days to talk to you about something. So, David is 20 and he's dating a 14year-old. If David had nothing to do with this girl's death, is David in trouble? Look, could he be prosecuted? Yes. Um, if she were alive, a lot more likely. Um, I've had in the last 10 years, I've probably done three or four of those cases. In the ones that I have handled, it is always a case where there's a very um kind of truncated, if you will, age gap. And there was always an indication in the cases I've handled where they didn't know the true age of the girl and only uh learned it either during the relationship after they'd fallen in love or something along those lines.
That for somebody to bring a statutory rape case and somebody would be the LA County DA. I can't imagine anybody in the sex crimes unit is going to say, "Hey, we did we h we don't have enough evidence to uh say that we've got a homicide here. We don't have enough em evidence besides being a homicide to elevate it to murder. But we're going to pursue a statutory rape. Highly unlikely. Unless there's something, which obviously there could be that we don't know yet.
I mean, who knows if there are videos? Who knows if there are uh selfies? Who knows if there is scientific evidence that's consistent with a transfer of DNA, a transference of DNA that would be consistent with that? or who knows if somebody didn't make a statement. I'm not saying he did, but uh I've seen cases where the uh the the purported defendant inculpates themsself and basically gives the cops what the cops couldn't get without their statement. Well, I I I'm kind of surprised you're saying this. um if if they find out that it's not David, but they know who it is that did this and they can pin that on them, somebody other than David, um you don't think Nathan Hawkman would go after this 20-year-old singer for allegedly having sex? We don't know if he did or not, but I mean, what if there are pictures in her phone or his phone or there's a video or something like that? You don't think Nathan Hawkman would go after him? if there was a video in her phone, if there was a video in his phone or somebody else's, if she had sent it to somebody else, if she had, you know, which happens quite a bit, uh, if they had independent evidence that way, one of the things they would presumably do, building on your hypothetical, if they charge somebody else, they could subpoena him to that preliminary hearing, probable cause proceeding and force him to either invoke the fifth or force them to give him immunity in some kind if they needed it.
Look, they're not going to or traditionally I I don't have to get into what I think Nathan Hawkman might do. I it's way above my pay grade. But I will tell you that traditionally they are not going to kind of go after the getaway driver in order to avoid prosecuting the bank robber. But it doesn't have to be either or. No, it doesn't have to be either or. But if they need uh David, if David is not their suspect, if he's not the perpetrator, if he is not, they they could kind of force him and they may need him. And he's got a lawyer who would presumably give him the advice that you got to play a little chicken here in order to get yourself so that you can tell the truth.
I just disagree with you on this. I I think there's been such shock of him dating, you know, it's it's kind of Elvisy. It's kind of Elvisy, but you know, back then it wasn't viewed the way it is now. And everything I'm hearing from people is they keep talking about that. How could he be dating, you know, he's he seemed to have been dating a 13-year-old.
You know, they this went on for a while. She disappeared in 1 January of 2024. So she was 13 and barely 13. So right, but I don't before we go down that road, you would want to have some kind of evidence that there was something unour going on. I I mean obviously that's a that's a red flag that law enforcement is going to drill down on, but I like I say it becomes less of a priority if in fact they've got evidence that points to somebody else and that's a legitimate legitimate lead or prosecutoal prosecutorial theory. So um even if I mean I just keep coming back to I keep coming back to this. How could anybody be this dumb? Yeah. Yeah. I I I'm having the same problem. I'm having the exact same problem that I mean, could it happen? Yes. Somebody could be that dumb. But but that's the defense if he's charged. That's the defense if he's charged. That who would do that? And you know, and a jury is going to wrestle.
I mean, I don't know what they're going to do, but if they ended up charging him, to me, the best argument is that, who would do that? Who would put the body in you in the your car and you leave town knowing the car is going to get towed and they're going to find the body? Who would do that? That, you know, it's almost like jurors are going to struggle with that no matter how powerful the evidence.
So, I'm going to end, you know, how much I love reading the comments to our show. I'm gonna No, you love You know, you love reading the comments. You love reading the comments because on Sundays you text me and say, "God, people just hate you, Harvey." No, they like me. They like me, but boy, they are going after you. So, I will preview some of the comments. Okay, Garagus, you defended Scott Peterson. Who gives an alibi where the body is found four months later? So, I can So, I'm going to save you the trouble.
I've already done the heavy lifting. Okay. Oh my god. Um, okay. Well, this is I I got to tell you, this is one of the most interesting cases I have seen in a long time. And we just don't know. You know, who's been doing the reporting on this? You know, I met Laura Conland at the Diddy trial and she I thought I was impressed with her. I thought of all the kind of um people that were reporting on it. She did a great job. She's really kind of gone deep into this. In fact, I've been watching her. I've been telling her that I where her sources are cuz she's in New York and as you know LA is it's kind of crazy because they are never the authorities in LA in my experience and your experience and between us we got a hundred years doing this frighteningly.
Um um this I'm with you in that this doesn't make a whole lot of sense given the track record of the LA kind of county authorities. I know. But I I just have a feeling something's going to break fairly soon. Um they just can't keep quiet this long and they've got to have a lot of information once they get the Tesla video, once they get the surveillance video from the house um and all the other things they're working on. I I just have a feeling uh this is we're going to hear something soon.
I really do. Well, it's uh hopefully they get the right person or they figure out what happened. Well, as you know, whoever they arrest, the lawyer will say it's the wrong person. Correct. Well, and it could be. Yeah. Okay, my friend. Talk I'll talk to you soon. Thank you, Harvey. Good to see you. See you. Bye-bye..
