Five charged in connection with Friends star’s death

Police say five people have been charged in connection with Matthew Perry’s drug-related death last year, including two doctors and the actor’s personal assistant.

Police said on Thursday that their investigation, launched in May, uncovered a “vast criminal underground network” of drug suppliers who had distributed large quantities of ketamine.

Perry, 54, died at his Los Angeles home in October. An autopsy found high levels of ketamine in his blood and determined the “acute effects” of the controlled substance killed him.

“These defendants exploited Mr. Perry’s addiction problems to enrich themselves,” U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada said Thursday. “They knew what they were doing posed a great risk to Mr. Perry, but they did it anyway.”

Three defendants — including Perry’s assistant — pleaded guilty to drug charges, while two others — a doctor and a woman known as the “Ketamine Queen” — were arrested on Thursday, according to the Justice Department.

Ketamine – a powerful anaesthetic – is used to treat depression, anxiety and pain. People close to Perry told the police inquest after his death that he was undergoing ketamine infusion therapy.

But his last treatment session was more than a week before he died. The medical examiner said the ketamine in Perry’s system could not have come from the infusion therapy because of the drug’s short half-life.

According to medical examiners, the concentration of ketamine in his body was as high as the amount used during general anesthesia.

The indictment filed in federal court detailed the elaborate drug-purchasing scheme that prosecutors say ultimately led to Perry’s death.

Prosecutors said Perry’s assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, worked with two doctors to supply the actor with more than $50,000 (£38,000) of the drug ketamine in the weeks before his death.

Officials argued that those involved in the scheme were trying to profit from Perry’s well-known substance abuse problems. One of the doctors, Salvador Plasencia, allegedly wrote in a text message: “I wonder how much this idiot is going to pay.”

According to the indictment, Mr. Plasencia, 42, provided ketamine to Perry “outside the scope of his usual professional activities and without a legitimate medical purpose.”

According to police charges, he also allegedly taught Iwamasa how to inject ketamine into Perry without proper safety procedures and supervision.

Prosecutors allege that in the four days before his death, Iwamasa injected Perry with at least 27 doses of ketamine.

He did so even after a large dose of ketamine earlier that month left Perry “frozen,” prompting Plasencia to advise against similar doses in the future, prosecutors said. The doctor left several vials of the drug for the actor and his assistant after the incident, according to the indictment.

Others charged in the case include Jasveen Sangha, known as the “Ketamine Queen,” who supplied the drug to Plasencia with the help of two other defendants, Erik Flemming and Dr. Mark Chavez.

Chavez, Flemming and Iwamasa have all pleaded guilty.

The U.S. Justice Department said Ms. Sangha and Mr. Plasencia will be arraigned in Los Angeles court on Thursday afternoon.

Prosecutors said the defendants attempted to conceal their alleged crimes after Perry’s death.

Ms. Sangha allegedly texted another suspect, asking him to “delete all our messages.” Mr. Plasencia also falsified medical records, according to the indictment.

Drowning was also listed as a contributing factor in Perry’s death, which was ruled an accident. Other contributing factors were coronary artery disease and the effects of buprenorphine, which is used to treat opioid use disorder.

At the height of his fame, Perry struggled with addiction to painkillers and alcohol, and entered rehab several times. He detailed his struggles with substance abuse in his memoir, Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing.

In 2016, he told BBC Radio 2 that he could not remember three years of filming Friends due to drink and drug use.

After several treatments, he wrote in his memoir that he had been mostly sober since 2001 – “except for about 60 or 70 unfortunate times”.