A judge previously convicted Chasing Horse of 13 charges, mostly relating to the assault of Indigenous women and girls.

Dances With Wolves actor Nathan Chasing Horse sentenced to life in prison for sexual assault

A judge previously convicted Chasing Horse of 13 charges, mostly relating to the assault of Indigenous women and girls.

By Mekishana Pierre

Mekishana Pierre

Mekishana Pierre is a news writer at **. She has been working at EW since 2025. Her work has previously appeared on Entertainment Tonight and Popsugar.

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April 28, 2026 1:32 p.m. ET

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Nathan Chasing Horse appears in court on Jan. 7, 2026. Credit:

Chase Stevens/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Tribune News Service via Getty

- *Dances With Wolves* star Nathan Chasing Horse has been sentenced to life in prison for sexual assault.

- A Nevada judge gave the actor life in prison with the possibility of parole after 37 years.

- Chasing Horse was arrested in February 2023, after being accused of sexually abusing "young Indigenous girls over the course of two decades." The actor has continually denied all charges against him.

*Dances With Wolves* star Nathan Chasing Horse has been sentenced to life in prison after being convicted on 13 charges for sexually assaulting Indigenous women and girls.

A Nevada judge gave the actor his sentence on Monday, four months after the 49-year-old had been convicted of charges mostly relating to sexual assault, lewdness, and kidnapping, the Associated Press reports. While his sentence was for life, Chasing Horse will be eligible for parole after serving for 37 years. The actor has continually denied all charges against him.

Chasing Horse was arrested in February 2023, after being accused of sexually abusing "young Indigenous girls over the course of two decades." The actor was also accused of leading a cult called the Circle, under which he "used spiritual traditions and their belief system as a tool to sexually assault young girls on numerous occasions," according to a 50-page search warrant obtained by the AP.

In the Nevada warrant, Chasing Horse is accused of multiple sex crimes, including sex trafficking, sexual assault of a child younger than 16, child abuse, filming sexual assaults, and receiving payment for arranging sex with victims. It also noted that Chasing Horse was previously banned from the Fort Peck Reservation in Poplar, Mont., due to allegations of sex trafficking in 2015.

Nathan Chasing Horse in 'Dances With Wolves'.

The filing also reportedly claimed that his followers viewed Chasing Horse as a "Medicine Man" or "Holy Person" who had the ability to communicate with higher beings.

The authorities received a tip-off in October 2022, launched an in-depth investigation, and arrested the actor amid a raid of his North Las Vegas home. At the time, Las Vegas police said they identified at least six alleged victims — some as young as 13 years old — and discovered sexual allegations against Chasing Horse that police say date back to the early 2000s and span across several states, including Montana, Nevada, and South Dakota.

In January, jurors found Chasing Horse guilty of 13 of the 21 charges he faced. During the 11-day trial, jurors heard from three women who said the actor sexually assaulted them, some of whom were underage at the time, per the Associated Press.

One of his victims, Corena Leone-LaCroix, who was 14 at the time the abuse started and came forward publicly, said: "There is no way to get back the youth, the childhood loss, my first time, my first kiss, the graduation I never got to have. The life that little girl could have lived has been taken from me forever."

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Chasing Horse allegedly told Leone-LaCroix when she was 14 that the spirits wanted her to give up her virginity to save her mother, who was diagnosed with cancer. He then sexually assaulted her and told her that if she told anyone, her mother would die, according to Deputy District Attorney Bianca Pucci. The sexual assaults continued for years, Pucci said.

"You preyed on these women's trusts and their spirituality, and you manipulated them for your own personal gratification," Judge Jessica Peterson told Chasing Horse before she announced his sentence.

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Chasing Horse has also been charged with sex crimes in Canada. The British Columbia Prosecution Service said the actor was charged with sexual assault in February 2023, though the date of the alleged offense took place in September 2018 near Keremeos, a village about four hours east of Vancouver, per the Associated Press. In November 2023, the case paused due to Chasing Horse's charges in the United States, but resumed the following year.

Once Chasing Horse has been sentenced and all of his appeals have been exhausted in the U.S., British Columbia prosecutors will assess next steps in their prosecution.

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