LAME DEER — A bounty hunter says he spent more than two weeks tracking a man wanted in connection with a homicide in Billings on the Northern Cheyenne Reservation in Lame Deer — and found him — but says authorities have not moved to arrest him.
See the challenges of tracking the suspect in the video below:
Leeland Chapman, known for his appearances on "Dog the Bounty Hunter," took a case in Montana involving Sage Spang, a man Billings police have been seeking in connection with a possible homicide.
"I work all over the country, and I got a job in Montana looking for an individual by the name of Sage Spang," Chapman said.
Chapman says he spotted Spang multiple times on the Northern Cheyenne Reservation — at a gas station, in a parking lot, and at a bar. Even when Chapman did not have direct eyes on Spang, he says sources were sending him messages with updates on Spang's location.
"When I got the case and I started looking at it, I seen that in January, July of 2025, the Billings Police Department were looking for him for a possible homicide," Chapman said.
Finding Spang, Chapman says, was not the problem.
"He wasn't difficult to locate. I just legally can't go on there and arrest him. And from what they tell me, they can't do it neither," Chapman said.
Because reservations fall under federal jurisdiction, not every law enforcement agency has authority to make arrests there. Only the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the FBI are permitted to do so. MTN spoke with the Bureau of Indian Affairs about this case, and they declined to comment.
Chapman says the lack of action has been a source of deep frustration.
"It's just like, that nobody wants to do it. And it's this, they're, they're making up these roadblocks that I just, I don't know if they're real roadblocks, or if they're just excuses," Chapman said.
Northern Cheyenne Tribal President Gene Small says he has been waiting more than 25 days for a judge to sign a warrant in the case.
"Here at our level is that, there's warrants out for him now, and we're just waiting for my understanding of the judge to sign off on him. So they'll be coming out soon here," Small said.
Small says Spang has continued to commit crimes while at large, including a recent accusation of assaulting another person.
"We want to get a hold of him because we can't be having that in our community," Small said.
For Chapman, the weeks of work have so far yielded no result.
"I was there for 17 days working this kid with everything that I got," Chapman said.
