Doctor in Matthew Perry overdose case sentenced to 2½ years in prison
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Salvador Plasencia (left) acknowledged then that he injected Matthew Perry with ketamine at the actor’s home and in the back seat of a parked car, and that doing so was not for legitimate medical purposes.
PHOTOS: EPA, REUTERS
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LOS ANGELES – A California doctor was sentenced to 2½ years in prison on Dec 3 for illegally supplying Friends sitcom star Matthew Perry with ketamine, the powerful sedative that caused the actor’s drug overdose death in 2023.
Salvador Plasencia, 44, who operated an urgent-care clinic outside Los Angeles, pleaded guilty in federal court in July
He could have faced up to 40 years in prison for the crime.
Perry was found by his live-in assistant floating face down and lifeless in the hot tub
An autopsy report concluded he died from the “acute effects of ketamine”, which combined with other factors in causing him to lose consciousness and drown.
Ketamine is a short-acting anaesthetic with hallucinogenic properties that is sometimes prescribed to treat depression and other psychiatric disorders. It has also seen widespread abuse as an illicit party drug.
Plasencia acknowledged then that he injected Perry with ketamine at the actor’s home and in the back seat of a parked car, and that doing so was not for legitimate medical purposes.
Perry had publicly acknowledged decades of substance abuse, including the years he starred as Chandler Bing on the hit 1990s NBC television series Friends.
According to federal law enforcement officials at the time charges were brought in the case, Perry had been receiving ketamine infusions for treatment of depression and anxiety at a clinic where he became addicted to the drug.
When doctors there refused to increase his dosage, he turned to unscrupulous providers elsewhere who saw Perry as a way to make quick money satisfying what became his latest addiction, the authorities said.
Plasencia, who practised medicine in the Los Angeles suburb of Calabasas, said he obtained the ketamine from another doctor, co-defendant Mark Chavez of San Diego.
According to court filings, Plasencia once texted Chavez about Perry, writing: “I wonder how much this moron will pay.”
Matthew Perry’s mother Suzanne Perry (left) and his stepfather Keith Morrison leaving the courthouse in Los Angeles on Dec 3.
PHOTO: AFP
Within weeks, Perry was dead from an overdose of ketamine supplied by yet another co-defendant – a drug dealer known as the “Ketamine Queen” – and injected by the actor’s personal assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa.
Before sentencing Plasencia to 30 months in prison and a US$5,600 (S$7,260) fine, US District Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett said: “You and others helped Mr Perry stay on the road to such an ending while continuing to feed his addiction.”
Addressing the court before the judge imposed sentence, amid audible sobs from his mother and Perry’s relatives, Plasencia expressed remorse and said he took full responsibility for his actions.
“I failed Mr Perry, I failed his family and I failed the community,” he said, before turning to directly face members of Perry’s family seated in the courtroom and adding: “I’m just so sorry.”
Delivering a victim impact statement earlier in the proceeding, Perry’s mother, Suzanne Morrison, said: “There is an oath that doctors take, and I think it really got forgotten.”
Looking directly at Plasencia, she said, “I want you to see this is the mother” and added “this was a bad thing to do”.
Four other defendants – Chavez, 55; Iwamasa, 60; Jasveen Sangha, 42, also known as “Ketamine Queen”; and go-between dealer Erik Fleming, 56 – have pleaded guilty in connection with Perry’s death and are scheduled to be sentenced in the coming weeks. REUTERS
