Dear Foxfire,
I do not know if she was wearing earrings, I have never read anything about it.
As for her defensive wounds, that was reported by the coroner and police. The wounds were on her arms and occurred from her raising her arms to protect herself from the blade, if she had her throat cut first, that would not have happened in that manner. Secondly, if the killer did hide behind the door and closed it before attacking her, as he would have had to, then the door alone would have caused her to turn around. I do not believe she was killed from behind.
She was a large woman and it would be difficult to hold her up while cutting her throat. The most likely scenario is that she was attacked from in front and had her throat cut after she fell to the ground.
The final cut prior to her dying was most likely the throat, the mutilation would have occurred after she died, specifically the breast cut. In order to do that she would have already been on the ground. That means the killer was covered in blood from kneeling down. One should also consider that the body was staged, again, after she died and on the ground.
The killer entered and exited through the back, through the door that the police kept in evidence. He did not come in through the windows as those were all checked by her elderly friend who reported that he tapped on all the windows and he reported no sign of forced entry or broken windows and reported the front door was locked which means it was not broken into and the video shows that nobody entered or exited through the front.
Once we assume that the killer was covered in blood, we are left with few options. Firstly, the killer walked out the back in view of the police station, other houses and the gas station covered in blood on a bright Sunday. Two, the killer brought a change of clothes along with whatever chemicals he used to destroy the DNA evidence. The last option is that the killer was wearing protective clothing, perhaps rain-wear or plastic bags of some sort.
As for her hair being set on fire and 4 inches remaining, it may be that the blood put out the fire and that is the manner in which it self extinguished. As her neck had been nearly severed off, there would have been a lot of blood covering the back of her head once she was on the ground.
In the end the reason for considering how she was killed only has value if it leads us to understanding who the killer was and/or their motivation. I do not believe the killer was attempting to burn down the building to hide the evidence, there would be no need to use chemicals to destroy the DNA evidence. In addition, setting her hair on fire is a pretty useless way of trying to set fire to the whole building which again begs the question of why he set the hair on fire. It is possible that he removed some of her hair and set fire to the rest so that the police would not look for the "trophy" hair to catch the killer. I think it is more likely that he was trying to make a statement.
What could the statement have been? Well, there is not much in the bible about the hair. It is called the glory of a woman and brought power to Samson. That is not quite accurate. Samson was of a group of men who would promise to never cut their hair as a testament to their dedication to God, I believe it says that his mother dedicated him to God. Samson got his strength from God, not from having hair. Having his hair removed did not take his powers, his lack of faith did, he lost his confidence and still managed to pull down the pillars after his hair was cut.
While I do not assume this was a religiously motivated killing, the burning of the hair is very unusual and the purpose is unclear. As a rule I do not believe a non-Christian would even think of burning off her hair unless there was a purpose like hiding the crime. I don't see how it hides this crime. Burning down the building would have been easier and destroyed more evidence. If the killer burnt her hair to remove her glory than it would make sense that they agreed with the bible. That is neither the opinion of an Atheist or a Satanist. They would not think of such a thing.
Is it possible that the killer was an incredibly fundamentalist Christian who hated felt that females being Pastors was an abomination? This did happen in the bible belt. Was removing her glory, her hair, a punishment? Just some thoughts.