Police are not ruling out the possibility that more than one person was involved in the murder of Joanna Yeates or that her killing was sexually motivated, it emerged today.
Detectives also said Yeates' landlord, Chris Jefferies, remains a suspect over the death of the 25-year-old landscape architect.
Officers gave more details about the investigation, revealing they had received more than 1,300 pieces of information, which had generated more than 900 lines of inquiry. The investigation team has categorised 239 of these as "high priority".
Police said they had so far viewed more than 100 hours of CCTV footage and were sifting through 293 tonnes of domestic rubbish seized in the area around Yeates' flat in Clifton, Bristol.
Chief Inspector Phil Jones, who is leading the investigation emphasised time and again that the inquiry was complex and could be time-consuming.
Speaking at the headquarters of Avon and Somerset police's major crime investigation unit, Jones said he wanted the public and Yeates' family to know that officers were exploring every possible hypothesis.
"We are carrying out painstaking, detailed forensic analysis of her flat and outcomes from this can take a considerable amount of time," he said.
Jones said he was "satisfied" that Yeates got back to her flat on the night she disappeared - December 17. "But I am not going to speculate whether she let someone into the flat, whether someone was already there or whether someone broke into the flat."
Yeates' body was found on Christmas morning on a rural roadside verge three miles from her flat but Jones said he could not say yet where or when she was killed or when the body was left where it was discovered. Snowfall on the morning of December 18 had "considerable impact" on this line of inquiry, he said.
Jones highlighted a reporting of a light-coloured 4x4 vehicle spotted that night close to the spot where the body was found and asked the driver of that car or any other in the area that night to come forward.
Yeates bought a pizza and cider as she walked home on the night she vanished. Neither the pizza nor its packaging have been found - though the receipt for it was at the flat. Jones said it was not clear if Yeates had eaten the pizza and officers are still searching for its packaging.
Jones said: "I can assure you we are determined to solve this crime and bring Jo's killers to justice."
Asked later about his use of "killers" rather than "killer", Jones said the use of the plural emphasised that he was not making any assumptions but was keeping an "open mind".
He said that there was no evidence Yeates had been sexually assaulted but he had not ruled out that there had been "sexual motive".
Pressed over whether there had been any "unauthorised entry" into Yeates' flat, Jones said only that his team was considering a number of hypotheses. Earlier in the inquiry police had said there was no sign of a break-in at the flat.
Jones said Yeates' landlord, former public school teacher Jefferies who was held for two days on suspicion of her murder, was on police bail and was therefore still a suspect.
Asked about a sighting attributed to Jefferies, 65, of three people leaving Yeates' flat shortly after she was last seen, Jones said all information that had been received was being examined. He said he was not prepared to "speculate" if there were any other suspects.
Jones rejected any idea there was a delay in carrying out forensic tests on Yeates' or Jefferies' flats.
Yeates' flat was searched shortly after she was reported missing and remained secured. The arrest of Jefferies and search of his flat, which is in the same building as Yeates', had been made "at an appropriate time as quickly as possible."
A police spokeswoman said officers had seized the bins from Yeates' flat on December 20 and the rest of the street on December 23.
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