By Stan Ozark 
Nathan Chasing Horse, the former “Dances with Wolves” actor accused of sexual abuse, was temporarily thrown out of court Monday after he disrupted proceedings with demands he be allowed to fire his defense attorney a week before trial.
Judge Jessica Peterson in Las Vegas ordered his jury trial to proceed next week as planned.
Chasing Horse has pleaded not guilty to 21 charges, including allegations that he sexually assaulted women and girls and that he filmed himself sexually abusing a girl younger than 14. Prosecutors allege he used his reputation as a spiritual leader and healer to take advantage of Native American women and girls over two decades.
Peterson ordered him removed from court Monday for trying to speak over her. He argued that his attorney, Craig Mueller, did not come to visit him and did not file timely. He asked that a public defender who previously represented him be his attorney.
Mueller, a private defense attorney, told the court his client was ready and privately told the judge that one of his investigators had visited with Chasing Horse. He declined to comment to The Associated Press.
Best known for portraying the character Smiles A Lot in the 1990 movie “Dances with Wolves,” Chasing Horse was born on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota, which is home to the Sicangu Sioux, one of the seven tribes of the Lakota nation.
Tribal authorities on the Fort Peck Indian Reservation (in Poplar, Montana, home to the Fort Peck Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes) banished Chasing Horse in 2015. Tribal leaders voted to bar him from the reservation amid allegations that included human trafficking, spiritual abuse, intimidation of tribal members, and other concerns about his conduct.
After his Nevada arrest and the accumulation of more evidence, the Fort Peck Tribal Court issued a warrant charging him with aggravated sexual assault tied to alleged incidents on the reservation from around 2005.
Tribal investigators said they could pursue the case once victims came forward following his Nevada arrest. However, Chasing Horse remains in custody in Nevada, and because he is banned from the reservation, he is unlikely to ever be taken into tribal custody on Fort Peck soil unless he is removed there from jail.
After starring in the Oscar-winning film, according to prosecutors, Chasing Horse began propping himself up as a self-proclaimed Lakota medicine man while traveling around North America to perform healing ceremonies. When he was arrested in 2023, he was living in a North Las Vegas house with his five wives, according to prosecutors.
The case sent shock waves across Indian Country. The original indictment was dismissed in 2024 after the Nevada Supreme Court ruled prosecutors abused the grand jury process when they provided a definition of grooming as evidence without any expert testimony. However, the court left open the possibility of charges being refiled, and a new indictment was brought later that year.
Prosecutors claim Chasing Horse led a cult called The Circle, and his followers believed he could speak with spirits. His victims went to him for medical help, according to a transcript from a grand jury hearing.
Prosecutors expect the trial to last three weeks. It is scheduled to begin next Monday.
Tim Phillips