Employees at Hollywood Tow on Mansfield Avenue discovered the body of Celeste Rivas Hernandez in the trunk of a vehicle on Sept. 8. (photo by Edwin Folven)

A grand jury investigation into the death of a teenage girl whose body was found in September in the trunk of a vehicle in Hollywood belonging to the singer D4vd took a new twist on Jan. 22 when a friend of the singer was arrested in Montana on charges of failing to appear as a witness in the investigation.

The grand jury is currently hearing testimony from friends, acquaintances and business associates of the singer, whose real name is David Anthony Burke, and had subpoenaed Burke’s friend Neo Langston, 23, to appear. After Langston, a social media influencer and photographer, did not appear for a grand jury hearing in Los Angeles, detectives with the Los Angeles Police Department’s Robbery-Homicide Division sought a court order forcing him to testify and a warrant for his arrest was issued. Langston was arrested on Jan. 22 in Helena, Mont., and returned to Los Angeles. He is held on $60,000 bail.

Authorities declined to provide any further information about the grand jury investigation or whether Langston has testified yet. A judge granted the LAPD’s request for a hold in the release of information due to the complex nature of the case.

Burke, 20, has not been named as a suspect in the death of 15-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez, whose decomposed body was found on Sept. 8 in a Tesla registered to Burke at the Hollywood Tow lot at 1015 N. Mansfield Ave. The teen, who was from Lake Elsinore in Riverside County, was reported missing by her family in April 2024 when she was 13 years old. At the time of her disappearance, the teen’s family members told police that Rivas Hernandez ran away twice before and that she had a boyfriend named David.

The Tesla was towed to the Hollywood Tow lot after it had been parked for weeks in the 1400 block of Bluebird Avenue in the Hollywood Hills, approximately two blocks from a home where Burke was staying at the time. The cause of Rivas Hernandez’s death remains deferred per the LAPD hold on the case.

Funeral services were held for Rivas Hernandez on Oct. 6. The grand jury investigation is expected to run until at least February. Anyone with information about the case is urged to call investigators with the LAPD’s Robbery-Homicide Division at (213)486-6890.