A Nevada judge has set bail at 15% cash of $300,000 dollars for Native American actor Nathan Chasing Horse, accused of sexually abusing Indigenous women and girls for decades.
Best known for a supporting role in Dances With Wolves, the 46-year old Chasing Horse will have to stay with a relative and be electronically monitored 24/7 if released from jail. He’s also barred from contact with minors or any of his accused victims.
His public defender says she’s happy with the judge’s decision and will point out weaknesses in the state’s case at Chasing Horse’s next court hearing later this month.
The prosecutor in the case opposed bail, telling the judge new evidence shows the actor was grooming young children to replace his older wives when he was arrested early last week.
About two dozen of Chasing Horse’s friends and relatives filled the courtroom in a show of support and cheered afterward, waving signs that translate to “Justice for Chasing Horse.”
Chasing Horse had been held without bail since Jan. 31, when SWAT officers and detectives took him into custody and raided the home he shares with his five wives in North Las Vegas.
Authorities describe him as the leader of a cult known as The Circle, which had about 300 members at its peak who believed Chasing Horse was a “medicine man” who could communicate with higher beings.
He’s accused of abusing that position to physically and sexually assault women and girls, and take underage wives for 2 decades across multiple states and Canada.
Chasing Horse was born on the Rosebud Reservation and is best known for playing the young Sioux Smiles a Lot in Dances With Wolves, which won the Oscar as best picture in 1990.
He was banished from the Fort Peck Reservation in Montana in 2015 amid allegations of human trafficking, and authorities in British Columbia, Canada, charged him this week with a sexual assault in 2018.