Dean Cummings went full-bore crazy

[TahoeJ]

Not to mention, I’m sure at some point we will get another YouTube video...

[SirVicSmasher]

Drug deal gone bad?

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[snowaddict91]

Drug deal gone bad?

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That's what I was thinking.

He donated some skis and gave a talk at one of our SAR avalanche seminars in probably 2012 or so? He was a bit out there, but not like NM trailer park murder out there.

[meter-man]

Somebody has to do an in depth story about this. It's definitely worthy of a several page article in Outside or some sort of similar publication.

I don't read ski magazines anymore but if theres a really good article on this story I'd grab a copy. this isn't your run of the mill "bro's go ski and explore uncharted territory with other bro's" generic and played out junk that I've grown tired of.

I find it interesting that Deans story basically ends in New Mexico. The New Mexico weird factor is definitely in play here.

He's from NM. From every Mag's favorite ski rag: https://www.skimag.com/athletes/9-wa...-dean-cummings

[snowaddict91]

"He was small, but he was scrappy. You didn't pick a fight with him-and if you did, you were dead."

Well that might as well have been bold and 72 font when I read it.

[happytimefunbox]

not sure if posted but worth a watch.

[smartyiak]

Somebody has to do an in depth story about this. It's definitely worthy of a several page article in Outside or some sort of similar publication...

Drug deal gone bad?

I didn't mean his story...prolly some sort of "descent into madness" type thing. (title is mine and I expect royalties), but the murder/death is probably only him and the dead guy and neither appears to be talking.

Could be a drug deal...tweakers tweaking...attempted robbery gone bad. We may never know.

Reading this thread (and that magazine article), I keep thinking of Jay Adams.

[SirVicSmasher]

Land of Entrapment isnt to lenient
And the prison gangs i NM are some of the most ruthless in the country

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[Benny Profane]

[Lupolicious]

Slightly updated info from Utah. Guess there were other people that witnessed what went down. Especially since 15 minutes elapsed between the witness calling 911 and Dean calling 911.

https://kjzz.com/news/local/former-u...ed-with-murder

Usually you mean business when you walk in a room with an AR-15...

[SB]

Sad story.

Be interested to hear what it’s all about.

[yeahman]

^^"Burning chemical that was sprayed in his face..."

Wasn't there something in all that earlier stuff (videos or whatever) where Dean was talking about catching his wife mixing batches of acid to spray on their kids or something? I recall something about that.

Paranoid schizophrenic IMO.

[warthog]

I guess along those lines, Micol....There was a set of the ginormously wide h20 pow skis unmounted at skitrucks in March during BBIU19.

I'll listen to that new link.
If that summary is accurate, it's really sad. This seems like maybe that very dangerous period after somebody's paranoid schizophrenia overwhelms them and before that process is under some form of management. I hope this stage comes to an end soon before anyone gets hurt. These are the times when somebody gets shot because they're an "agent"....or the voices tell you to...whatever...or the whole mental house of cards collapses and there's a suicide. The wild period between being a functional, untreated, free adult in society with cars and guns and credit cards and having all those assets and mobility and access to weapons with active delusional processes in place is especially frightening to me as my schizophrenic dad shot up my step family when I was a kid. Clearly it's not a given something awful will happen, but I'm just saying there's a real risk of truly catastrophic events (way beyond some lost heli-ski deposits) in these situations. I hope somehow someone can reach through and try to get a handle on this and make sure Dean and his family, and....like....the public, or whatever, are kept safe.

Obviously I'm more afraid of schizophrenic breaks than the average person. I just hope somebody can do something to get Dean some help. Nobody chooses for their brain tissue to malfunction, it is a scary disease.

Man, I haven't made it through the whole thread yet, but knowing the ending, this prediction from Sept. is chilling.

Sorry to hear what you went through with that terrible disease. My Uncle is Schizophrenic, and thankfully it was diagnosed while he was in the Air Force. Without those disabled veteran benefits, it would have either put my grandparents and parents in a rough spot, or he would have been homeless. Really scary stuff. Keeps me up at night worrying that one of my girls could suffer the same fate.

[mtnjam]

Kinda sad to see this go down given such a shining ski background and passion. I guess things in life just make people break apparently.

Maybe Dean was just trying to live a nice quiet hermit life after the H2O Guides thing and got caught up in the shitstorm of making money to get by.

Dunno, but yeah, sounds like a drug deal gone bad. Maybe Steve, The Stevenator, Stevie D got his blow flushed by Dean. I don't think TJ is coming to your rescue Dean.

[telefreewasatch]

This really hits my sad spot.

D'accord.

[easyrdr]

Dang, saw this back on the first page and told myself not to click it. I shouldn't have done it. So sorry to hear this.

[gaijin]

Somebody has to do an in depth story about this. It's definitely worthy of a several page article in Outside or some sort of similar publication.

I don't read ski magazines anymore but if theres a really good article on this story I'd grab a copy. this isn't your run of the mill "bro's go ski and explore uncharted territory with other bro's" generic and played out junk that I've grown tired of.

I find it interesting that Deans story basically ends in New Mexico. The New Mexico weird factor is definitely in play here.

Wow—

https://www.outsideonline.com/241023...charged-murder

[Lindahl]

^^"Burning chemical that was sprayed in his face..."

Wasn't there something in all that earlier stuff (videos or whatever) where Dean was talking about catching his wife mixing batches of acid to spray on their kids or something? I recall something about that.

Paranoid schizophrenic IMO.

My uncle went paranoid schizophrenic in his 50s. It's scary how a pretty much normal person can end up totally fucking crazy. He's mostly normal when he's on his meds at least. Luckily family could help him get straight and stay on the meds. It's really hard to interact with people when they think everyone is out to get them, scary because you're not sure what they're going to do to 'protect' themselves from the imaginary threat. A lot of the stories about Dean sound very similar to before my uncle got stabilized. I can totally see him bringing a gun, because he thought this guy was out to get him and he wanted to protect himself against the imaginary threat, the guy knows how crazy Dean is and he has a gun so he pepper sprays him to try and get away. Dean doesn't realize the pepper spray is in self defense and thinks the guy (who he believes is out to get him) is about to fuck him up, so he shoots, when really the guy was just trying to stop a crazy dude. Tragic.

[glademaster]

This whole situation saddens me more and more as I think about it. I feel like there are more sad endings than happy ones to have emerged from that generation of big mountain skiers. McConkey, Meiners and Coombs are dead, there's this shit with Dean, Nobis had his run-ins with the law, etc. Seems like Seth and Dean Conway are among the few who are still around and getting after it. I know I'm forgetting some people, but the point stands.

[PointsNorth]

Deleted for lack of professionalism on my part.

Quinner

[Long duc dong]

This is horribly sad regardless of the outcome. Even if it was self-defense, and he gets off, the fact that he was in this situation in the first place is really not good.

I have seen mental health issues in my own family. I don't have too much direct experience with schizophrenia, but we do have a family friend who has issues with it. It hit him in his 20's, he was a computer programmer when things went south. He was resistant to medication for many years, but luckily he finally acquiesced and agreed to get help. He has done better in recent years, but it can be a scary disease. Before he was medicated he used to do barn work, and occasionally yard work for my parents. My parents live in a rural part of the Hudson Valley, and they have a barn which often has a couple of stalls available. They don't tend to want money for them, just help with the barn from people they like in return for boarding. At one point we had a woman who boarded a horse there who had issues with him. It put my parents in a tough spot, because based on his behavior the woman was right to be concerned, he was dangerous. They eventually had to tell his mom, who my mom had grown up with, that they could not have him there if he was not going to get help, it was simply too dangerous. This was tough, but from what I have been told it was part of the motivation for him to actually get on a medication regimen. It was a tough situation, but in the end he has been doing better.

Dean Cummings was one of my heroes. In my mid and late teens, early 90's there were not too many ski heroes. There were Plake and Schmidt, Peterson and Pehota, Hattrup and some racers. When McConkey,, Kreitler, Seth, Cummings and all of those guys came around I was really pumped. We finally had a scene that was ours, the way surfers and snowboarders did. I will never forget my first time seeing MSP and TGR films. I remember lots of Cummings footage. I remember his segment in Sick Sense, set to the Pennwise song 'Wake Up.' It was a really great time to be a skier, we finally had guys ripping to punk rock, we were getting better equipment. It was as if the industry finally woke up and realized they should be marketing skiing as a punk rock sport, not as one for people who want to carve on groomers and listen to non-threatening music. And that is coming from a guy who has a analyzes data for a living, which is far from punk rock so to speak. In the mid-90s I was going to college in Santa Barbara. I went to Mammoth a couple of weekends a month, and spent most of my vacation days there. Among snowboarders who knew what was up, there was respect for those of us who were really into skiing, but among casual people you could not just be a skier. You were either a racer, or someone who skied, but you could not be a skier as your identity in the way that one could be a snowboarder or a surfer. Cummings and that generation changed that. By 96 things were starting to change, you could be a skier again in the way that you could be a snowboarder and a surfer. It was so awesome to finally have ski heroes and an industry. I will never forget seeing a segment from Continuum on tv in the fall of 96. It was on ESPN, they were focusing on action sports or something like that. They showed the segment of Kreitler in the Jackson backcountry set to 'Freedom Like a Shopping Cart' by NOFX. I was euphoric, I could finally watch skiers killing it to punk rock, somethings I had seen in surf videos for years. The McConkey/Kreitler/Gordy/Dean/Dav generation will always be special to me.

This is a horrible outcome, regardless of how it ends. I have no idea what the truth is regarding anything in this thread, but no one is winning regardless.

[Gunder]

Guy deserves everything he has coming to him. I hope they throw the key away. He beat his wife, played head games with people in the community and terrorized others with frivolous law suits or threats. Tortured his staff with BS and list goes on and on. Sad deal someone can go that bat shit crazy but its been mounting for a long time (years). He has restraining orders against him from multiple entities. Fuck that guy! Yep I said that. When and if he gets out in 30 years my gun will still be loaded and on stand by. Guy was the biggest kook the industry has ever seen. Claiming BS first descents and taking credit for things that were done by others. Drangons back spine...shit was skied 10 times before he did. His rope still hangs on the Tusk. Too bad it didnt wrap around his neck then. Would of saved his poor kids a lot of headache and torture going forward. Prayers to them. Sorry for the rant. Its honest.
H2NO MOE!

Quinner

He was also notorious for drastically over billing heli hours as well. H2O, Sean Dog and Pete from Yukon Heli all have more mental diseases between the three of them than the average city. My advice is to stay clear from each of them. All 3 are notorious for making it sound like you are getting a deal when in reality you’re getting fucked over.

[Benny Profane]

This whole situation saddens me more and more as I think about it. I feel like there are more sad endings than happy ones to have emerged from that generation of big mountain skiers. McConkey, Meiners and Coombs are dead, there's this shit with Dean, Nobis had his run-ins with the law, etc. Seems like Seth and Dean Conway are among the few who are still around and getting after it. I know I'm forgetting some people, but the point stands.

Dude, these people jump off cliffs. They are of a higher order in a certain part of the brain that I suspect does a Venn chart with substance abuse.

Plake is ok.

[TahoeJ]

The Blizzard of Ahhhs crew appears to remain unfazed, however. Plake, Schmidt and Tom Day are all doing well...

[grinch]

Hattrup as well i believe

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