ITA. He is clearly showing signs of escalation. Most if not all serial killers started out with some sort of pattern that escalated - killing animals, assaulting and raping women, and so on. They got addicted to the power they had over animals or women, and it got worse. I'm sure he's spent his time after the Natalee killing assaulting and raping women, and this time he was so desperate for money that it blew out of control. This is not someone who is going to stop after this. He would have had more and more victims, and we would have seen more and more women dead at his hands (if there's not already victims we haven't heard about).
Serial killers also don't like a loss of control either, which is why some kill more and more as things are getting out of their control. It's their attempt at trying to reign in control again, but it doesn't work, and they start to get sloppy until they mess up so much that they finally get caught. I think this is what might have happened her. Assaulting and raping women probably gave him a sense of power and control for a long time. Then his father died, his mother cut him off, and he probably knew he was being setup for the wire fraud. Things were totally out of his control. I bet there more victims we haven't heard of yet - maybe not murdered, but possibly beat up and robbed, maybe even raped.
Then he was losing at poker, and the one woman he picks out to have some fun with totally rejects him and probably refused to give him any of her money. He's used to getting his way with woman, and I bet that set him off. Maybe she even told him she was gay, and I bet that made him fly into a rage. He's probably the type that thinks one good romp in the sack with him would turn a gay woman straight. So not only does she reject him financially, she rejects him sexually at a time where he needed to feel accepted and in control. And then she has the nerve to fight him back!
So with his whole life going down the tubes, and this woman rejecting him, refusing to give him money, and finally refusing to give him any power over her, he couldn't hold back his anger and rage anymore, and unfortunately, she paid the price for it with her life. I don't think he wanted to go out with a bang as much as he couldn't hold back anymore and had to take it out on whatever woman happened to the unlucky victim he chose.
I am so glad he is off the streets and won't hurt anyone else. There is no help for him, and there is no way he wouldn't kill again and again if he got the chance to. This is someone that would look for opportunities, if not turn into a horrific serial killer. He does not need to be in society anymore.
