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It's the real life crime series that's divided armchair detectives across the country.

Now Scotland Yard's finest admit the disturbing case of Steven Avery as told on Netflix even has them baffled.

The case of Steven Avery , as featured in the hit documentary Making a Murderer , looks at whether a man wrongly convicted and jailed for a sexual assault and then released was responsible for a brutal killing or whether he was framed by police.

We spoke to a group of former Metropolitan Police murder detectives who have been following the series for their verdict. We asked: Is Avery guilty or not guilty and should he ever have been jailed for murder?

Here's what they had to say.....

"This has been a total police fit up"

Chris Burke - former anti terrorist branch officer and Detective Superintendent.

Chris said: "It's as plain as the nose on your face that this has been a total police fit up. The first wrongful conviction of rape was bad enough but this is an absolute outrage.

"It took six or seven searches to find Teresa's car key which was then found by officers who were involved in the first case against Steven.

"If Steven killed Teresa why would he hide her vehicle on his own car lot? Why wouldn't he have driven it somewhere else?

"If Teresa was tied up, stabbed and killed on the bed inside Steven's trailer as stated in Brendan's confession then where is the forensic evidence?

"My guess is that someone else on that site killed Teresa and saw the bonfire Steven and Brendan had set and took the opportunity to put her body in there when they weren't around.

"Brendan's confession would never have been allowed in a court in Britain. HE had no parent, no solicitor and seemed to agree with everything the detectives put to him before later denying it. He's of very low intelligence and nothing he said seemed to make any sense.

"I cannot believe that his evidence was admissible in court.

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"The whole thing reminds me of the case of Colin Stagg who was wrongly accused of the murder of Rachel Nikell who was killed on Wimbledon Common in 1992. The police were so sure they had their man they focused fully on him and didn't keep an open mind.

"Were there other people in Teresa's case that the police could have looked at ? You just have to watch the show to see that there were."

"I think the police made a lot of mistakes"

(Image: CSOFS)

Callum Sutherland ex-Met Detective Sergeant who has worked as a consultant for crime writer Lynda La Plante and is the acting vice President for the Chartered Society of Forensic Sciences.

Callum said: "I think Steven Avery is guilty and the documentary is edited in such a way to make us question that guilt.

"There's been a lot made about the lack of forensic evidence in the case. I think there's no forensics in the trailer because the victim was killed in Avery's garage. If he and Brendan had killed her on a sheet they could have simply burned it.

"There's not always a lot of blood when someone is murdered, it very much depends on how it's done.

"Brendan said he slit Teresa's throat but it may have been nothing more than a nick. There may not have been a lot of blood when she was stabbed because if, as Brendan confessed, the knife went into her heart most of the bleeding would most likely have been internal.

(Image: Netflix)

"I think Brendan is guilty because he knew things that only someone who was there would have known. He talked about Teresa's body having been in the back of her vehicle which would have been consistent with the blood that was discovered by police.

"I think they tried to clean up that blood but that the light wasn't great by then and they couldn't see it all. When the police look for blood stains they use bright lights which Avery and Dassey wouldn't have had access to at that time.

"I think the police made a lot of mistakes during the investigation which gave the defence room for manipulation. Most of those mistakes were due to a lack of experience in dealing with such huge cases and could have been made in Britain 20 years or so ago."

"Brendan's confession would never have been admissible in a British court"

Rod Goddard is an ex Detective Inspector of 20 years and has also worked as a criminal defence barrister.

Rod said: "A criminal trial is about "proof", not "truth".

"None of us actually know whether Steven Avery murdered Teresa, only he knows that. The question to be asked now is did he get a fair trial and the answer is almost certainly no and neither did Brendan Dassey .

"In Steven's trial, the prosecution's case theory is that Teresa was murdered in the garage, thus explaining the lack of forensic evidence in his trailer.

"You simply cannot rape, stab and slit someone's throat in a bed without leaving a mass of forensic evidence behind.

(Image: Collect)

"In Brendan's trial they asked the Jury to believe his confession that Teresa was tied up on the bed, stabbed and had her throat cut. Which was it?

"It seems to me that the prosecution can't have it both ways. It would have been interesting to see what would have happened had the two men been on trial together, which is probably why that didn't happen.

"In regard to Brendan's confession, it would never have been admissible in a British court.

"He was a child with learning difficulties questioned alone by two experienced detectives, without a parent or a solicitor present. No British court would have accepted his confession as evidence. Give me an hour with Brendan and I could have him admitting to anything I wanted.

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"That his lawyers, who supposedly acted in his best interests, persuaded him to make a detailed "confession", that they then handed over to the Police and allowed him again to be interviewed without his lawyer being present, frankly beggars belief. Any defence lawyer acting in that way in this jurisdiction would be struck off.

"There were many worrying aspects to the investigation of the case . The classic and often repeated failure in major crime investigations is that the Investigators decide early on who they think is guilty and then fail to investigate anyone else and exclude other evidence that doesn't fit with that theory.

"There were other potential suspects but little investigation of them.

"That all having been said, you cannot escape the fact that Teresa's body was found in a bonfire that Steven lit a few yards from his house shortly after her disappearance.

"Also that she was known to have visited his house at the material time and that he was the last person to see her alive. He would certainly have been one of the prime suspects.

As for the victim's car key that mysteriously appeared in Avery's trailer having lain there undetected for seven or so video recorded previous searches of the crime scene, you don't have to be a Scotland Yard Detective to form your own conclusions of that."

"In the UK the conviction would have been deemed unsafe"

(Image: Jackie Molton)

Former Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Malton is a TV script consultant and the inspiration for the character of DCI Jane Tennison in Prime Suspect.

Jackie said: "I just can't decide whether Steven and Brendan are guilty or not.

"I know that in this country they wouldn't have been found guilty in court in the UK because the conviction would have been deemed unsafe.

"There are so many questions as to why there was no forensic evidence found, about the implication police were involved in planting evidence, and the way the detectives reached their conclusions.

"In Steven's case I guess you can't get away from the fact that evidence not heard in the documentary reveals that he called his victim a number of times, withholding his number, before calling again to ask where she was. There's also no escape from the fact her body was found close to his house.

"I think he has disassociated his brain from this case because he uses the same tone of voice, words and phrases he used to explain he was innocent of his earlier conviction. it's like he's disconnected from any type of emotion.

"When it comes to Brendan, there is no evidence to prove that his confession details true events .

"It would be interesting to see what a police force from another country made of the case if they examined all the evidence under review."