ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. -- Channel 9's Eric Rasmussen carefully laid out the facts in the Casey Anthony case with a crime expert to try to piece together what really happened to the woman's 2-year-old daughter.

At last check, a garage at the sheriff's office is where detectives took Casey Anthony's car. They say it contained a number of troubling clues. Combine that with a timeline of events since little Caylee disappeared and at least one expert says there's a theory building about what really happened to the little girl.

Where is 2-year-old Caylee Anthony? Detectives may not yet have the answer, but it now appears they're working on one troubling scenario.

"There is a possibility this child is no longer alive?" a prosecutor asked Orange County Detective Yuri Melich during the bond hearing for Casey Anthony on Tuesday.

"Yes, that can be concluded," Melich said.

He confirmed a series of clues in court on Tuesday.

The Anthony's Backyard: Involved a tip that Casey Anthony borrowed a shovel from a neighbor. Two cadaver dogs pointed to the smell of decomposition near Caylee's playhouse.

Casey Anthony's Car: Detectives reported a different dog alerted to the same strong smell in the trunk after the white Pontiac had been abandoned in a parking lot.

"They have a hypothesis that the child may have somehow passed away," Dr. Richard Weinblatt told Eyewitness News.

Weinblatt, a former police chief and manager of Seminole Community College's Criminal Justice Program, said detectives must consider why there was evidence of a body in the car and at the home.

"The body could've been placed there and a person or persons could've changed their mind and decided to move the body elsewhere," he said.

Anthony's family insisted there was another reason for the smell.

"There was a bag of pizza for 12 days in a car full of maggots," Casey's mother Cynthia Anthony told reporters while leaving her daughter's bond hearing Tuesday.

"Do you think you would mistake the smell of a body for trash?" WFTV reporter Eric Rasmussen asked Weinblatt.

"Absolutely not. It's very, very distinctive," he said.

Weinblatt says other evidence from the car could solidify the case investigators are building.

"They say they found hair, they found a stain and they found dirt. What are they doing with that evidence? They have to process it. Where did the dirt come from? Does it match soil samples they found in the back yard?" he said.

Orange County detectives have not officially ruled out the chance that Caylee might still be alive and Weinblatt said it's not uncommon for investigators to consider multiple theories until they can nail one down for sure.