The Las Vegas police department arrested former actor Nathan Chasing Horse, 46, on Tuesday for running a sex cult and allegedly sexually assaulting Indigenous girls as young as 13.
Chasing Horse, who starred in the 1990 film “Dances With Wolves,” is the leader of the cult known as “The Circle” and has been charged with sex trafficking, sexual assault of a child younger than 16, and child abuse.
The months-long investigation was sparked by a tip police received in October 2022 and uncovered six victims who have accused Chasing Horse of abuse. The sexual abuse allegations date back to the early 2000s and span multiple states, including Montana, South Dakota, and Nevada, where he has lived for the past 10 years.
Chasing Horse, a Sicangu Sioux tribe member of the Lakota nation, was reportedly banished from the Fort Peck Reservation in Poplar, Montana, in 2015 due to allegations of human trafficking. He apparently attracted followers from tribes in the US and Canada who believed he was a “Medicine Man” and “Holy Person” who could communicate with higher beings and perform healing ceremonies.
The former actor allegedly used spiritual traditions and their belief system as a tool to sexually assault young girls on numerous occasions. Followers of The Circle cult reportedly offered their young daughters to Chasing Horse to take as wives.
The former actor is accused of prostituting young Indigenous girls by offering them for sex with other men who allegedly paid him. The warrant also states that Chasing Horse allegedly recorded his sexual assaults with his victims.
A search warrant stated that Chasing Horse allegedly trained his wives to use firearms, and told them to “shoot it out” with police if they tried to “break their family apart”. If the attack on police failed, the women were instructed to take “suicide pills”.
Chasing Horse was taken into custody as he left his home in North Las Vegas. Swat officers were seen outside the two-story home as detectives searched it.
A report by The Gauardian stated,
“Police found found firearms, 41lb of marijuana and psilocybin mushrooms and a memory card with multiple videos of sexual assaults, according to an arrest report released on Wednesday. Additional charges could be filed in connection with the videos of the underage girls, the report said.”
The arrest of Chasing Horse comes as prosecutors and lawmakers across the country have begun to pay greater attention to crimes against Indigenous women, including human trafficking and murder.
