Superficial cut

[Damaso Marte]

Hello Lucky. Thanks. But you already seem to have it clear. And later, in Annie's case, there seemed a manual attempt to finish the decapitation.

You will find a similar motif in animal slaughter--the animal must first be bled.

Cheers.
LC

I'm not familiar with the evidence for attempted decapitation in Nichols and Chapman (though I have heard of apparent decapitation intent from many sources and will assume that good evidence of this exists), but if we have two failed decapitations, it doesn't seem implausible that the killer might just give up the idea as futile. I'm sure we've all given up on dreams after trying and failing.