'Croydon Cat Killer' Is No Killer at All

For three years, Southern England has been in search of the Croydon Cat Killer, the seemingly macabre culprit behind a series of animal killings, mostly in the form of beheadings. Now, after the deaths of some 400 cats, police say the case has been closed—and that the killer wasn't human after all. The Telegraph reports Scotland Yard believes most of the feline victims were killed by cars and then descended on by foxes, whose scavenging left them without heads or tails.

Autopsies on six animals revealed fox DNA on all but one of them and noted the presence of puncture wounds; further, surveillance footage police were able to obtain in some instances showed no human culprit but did capture foxes carrying cats or parts of cats three times. The Guardian recounts that one London woman who found a "mutilated body" of a cat in her garden reviewed security footage and saw a fox carrying a cat's head in. The BBC reports the cases will now be logged as "no crime." (But there does seem to be a cat killer on the loose in Washington state.)