Rapid City’s Knife-Wielding Casino Robbery Suspect Shot by Police

• Police use less-lethal round to disarm knife-wielding robbery suspect.
• Feather arrested after threatening officers amid ongoing criminal investigations.
• Second casino robbery suspect still unconfirmed as detained or at large.

A suspect in an August 28 robbery at Joker’s Casino in Rapid City, S.D. was shot Sunday by police using a less-lethal launcher – a device that fires sponge rounds or pepper balls, according to the Rapid City Police Department (RCPD).

John Feather, 43, of Lead, S.D., was assessed at a local hospital before being taken into custody.

He was one of two suspects police were seeking in relation to an incident at Joker’s where a patron was lured outside, assaulted, and robbed of his winnings, according to a December 4 RCPD news release.

Police did not divulge the amount taken from the victim, but the they did circulate images of Feather and his fellow suspect, Robert White Plume, 39, which had been captured by the casino security cameras, along with an appeal for information.

Police Seek Pair

Both men were the subject of arrest warrants on charges of robbery and false imprisonment when police were called to a reported disturbance at around 4:20 p.m. on December 7 at an O’Reilly Auto Parts store in the city.

When they arrived, they observed a man, later determined to be Feather, standing outside of the business behaving erratically.

At this point, another officer arrived at the scene armed with the less-lethal launcher. When Feather continued to ignore commands to drop the knife, the officer fired one round, hitting Feather in the leg. This caused the suspect to drop the knife, allowing officers to make the arrest.

Criminal History

Feather has previous. In fact, police records show he was arrested the day after the casino robbery – before he was a suspect in that incident – because of “a disturbance involving a knife.”

Feather is still facing several unresolved charges from the last few years, including a simple assault case from November, an obstruction charge related to the knife incident, another simple assault filed in September 2024, a second-degree rape allegation from 2022, and an aggravated assault on a law enforcement officer dating back to August 2021, according to The Rapid City Journal.

RCPD has not said whether the second suspect in the casino robbery, who also has a lengthy criminal history, remains at large.