Following a months-long investigation into how Matthew Perry obtained the ketamine that led to his death in October 2023, multiple people, including the actor’s assistant and two doctors, have been arrested and charged.
“That investigation has revealed a broad underground criminal network responsible for distributing large quantities of ketamine to Mr Perry and others,” U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada announced during an Aug. 15 press briefing.
Those charged include Perry’s former personal assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, two doctors, Salvador Plasencia and Mark Chavez, a man named Eric Fleming who is accused of supplying the drugs to Iwamasa, and alleged drug dealer, Jasveen Sangha, who Estrada alleged was known colloquially as “LA’s ‘Ketamine Queen.’”
Now, almost one year since Perry’s passing, Chavez has become the latest member of Perry’s inner circle to plead guilty, with the doctor making his first court appearance on October 3, 2024.
Perry, who had been open about his struggles with substance abuse, which he said began at age 14 and intensified during his role on Friends, died at age 54 after being discovered unresponsive in a hot tub at his Los Angeles home.
An autopsy later found levels of ketamine in his blood similar to levels used during anaesthesia.
During the press conference, Estrada alleged Perry, who had been on official ketamine therapy to treat his mental health, had fallen back into his addiction shortly before his death, alleging that those charged knowingly took advantage of his addiction.
The charges brought include conspiracy to distribute ketamine, distribution of ketamine resulting in death, maintaining drug-involved premises, altering and falsifying records related to a federal investigation and multiple other drug trafficking counts.
“These defendants took advantage of Mr Perry’s addiction issues to enrich themselves,” Estrada alleged. “Defendant Plasencia worked with another medical doctor, defendant Mark Chavez, to obtain ketamine. He then worked with Mr Perry’s live-in assistant defendant Kenneth Iwamasa to distribute that ketamine to Mr Perry over two months. Defendant Plasencia saw this as an opportunity to profit off of Mr Perry. He wrote in a text message in September 2023, ‘I wonder how much this moron will pay.’”
According to the Department of Justice, Perry’s live-in assistant, Iwamasa, admitted to “repeatedly” injecting his boss with ketamine “without medical training,” including on Oct. 28, 2023, the day of the actor’s death, and pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine causing death.
“They knew what they were doing was wrong. They knew what they were doing was risking great danger to Mr Perry, but they did it anyways,” Estrada alleged during the Aug. 15 press conference. “In the end, these defendants were more interested in profiting off Mr Perry than caring for his wellbeing.”
While both Plasencia and Sangha have pleaded not guilty, in the year following Perry’s passing, Dr Chavez has pleaded guilty to conspiring to distribute ketamine to Perry, with his lawyer stating after the hearing that the 54-year-old is “incredibly remorseful” and “trying to do everything in his power to right the wrong that happened here.”
In his plea agreement, Chavez revealed that he had obtained doses of the surgical anaesthetic from his former clinic and from a wholesaler using a fraudulent prescription – an offence that can carry up to 10 years in prison.
Perry died at the age of 54 and his death was originally ruled accidental with an autopsy revealing he died from acute effects of ketamine, with other contributing factors.
In May, TMZ reported that authorities were investigating where the actor got Ketamine from.
Perry was very open about his addiction struggles but was believed to be sober leading up to his passing. His book Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing, which he released in 2022, included details about his addiction issues.
“Not only do I have the disease, but I also have it bad,” he wrote. “I have it as bad as you can have it, in fact. It’s back-to-the-wall time all the time. It’s going to kill me…”
Perry previously shared that he wanted to be in a good place with his struggles before delving into his dark past in a book.
Talking to People in 2022, he shared, “I wanted to share when I was safe from going into the dark side again.”
“I had to wait until I was pretty safely sober—and away from the active disease of alcoholism and addiction—to write it all down. I was pretty certain that it would help people if I did.”
Best known for playing sarcastic jokester Chandler Bing on Friends, Perry’s shocking death rocked his former costars as well as his fans around the world.
Jennifer Aniston, who starred alongside him in the sitcom, recently got teary while discussing her late co-star in an interview with Grazia.
The actress apologised for her emotional display before assuring, “I’m ok, it’s happy tears!”
Aniston isn’t the only friend who keeps Perry fondly in her mind since his passing. Courteney Cox, who played his wife Monica on Friends, recently revealed that she still feels him around.
Speaking on CBS Sunday Morning she shared, “He visits me a lot, if we believe in that,” adding, “I talk to my mom, my dad, Matthew.”
“I feel like there are a lot of people that are — I think that guide us. I do sense, yeah, I sense Matthew’s around for sure.”
If any of the issues raised in this article have affected you, help is available.
If you or someone you know needs help, please call the National Alcohol and Other Drug hotline 1800 250 015 or call Lifeline on 13 11 14.
