As you say, that area of the boy is definately the worst, I hadn't realised that the picture had been torn - but I'm sure you're right again. The second parting also appears to have that repeat pattern of poor cloning.
Denn
Hmm. I think the white area - the "second parting" - is a scratch or bend damage of sorts.. like it has been slightly bumped and stretched right there, and the coating has spread slightly and later worn off a bit from friction against other surfaces..
If you look closely, enhance contrast a wee bit and do an "auto color", you'll see there's a darker half circle but in reverse, to the left of it. Togeher they form a kind of leaf shaped circle, pointing north by northwest. Subtle stuff. It could have been slightly pushed against the head of a nail or something.
The three darker small strokes aren't indentical - not sure what they are.
As for the boys hair, you may well be right and it's cloning all together. Ugly damage
- regardless.
Fun to fantasize about how damages came to be.. it can aid the retouch if one gets a idea about what happened in various areas. Retouching is a kind of "reverse engineering".
Here's a version with less second parting:
