A Los Angeles doctor who sold ketamine to Matthew Perry before his overdose death has been sentenced to two and a half years in prison.
Dr Salvador Plasencia, 44, had pleaded guilty on Wednesday to giving Perry ketamine in the month leading up to the Friends star’s overdose death in 2023. Perry died at 54 after struggling with addiction for years, dating back to his time as one of the biggest stars of his generation for his role as Chandler Bing.
The actor had been taking the surgical anesthetic ketamine legally as a treatment for depression. But when his regular doctor would not provide it in the amounts he wanted, he turned to Plasencia, who admitted to illegally selling to Perry and knowing he was a struggling addict.
He texted another doctor that Perry was a “moron” who could be exploited for money, according to court filings.
Perry was found dead in his Los Angeles home by his assistant, and a medical examiner ruled that ketamine was the primary cause of death.
The judge emphasized that Plasencia did not provide the ketamine that killed Perry, but told him: “You and others helped Mr Perry on the road to such an ending by continuing to feed his ketamine addiction.”
“You exploited Mr Perry’s addiction for your own profit,” she said.
Plasencia was led from the courtroom in handcuffs as his mother cried loudly in the audience.
Plasencia’s lawyers had tried to give a sympathetic portrait of him as a man who rose out of poverty to become a doctor beloved by his patients, some of whom provided testimonials about him for the court. The attorneys called his selling to Perry “reckless” and “the biggest mistake of his life”.
Perry’s mother and two half sisters were in attendance at the hearing and gave tearful victim impact statements before the sentencing.
“The world mourns my brother,” Madeleine Morrison said. “He was everyone’s favorite friend.”
“You called him a ‘moron’”, Suzanne Perry said to Plasencia. “There is nothing moronic about that man. He was even a successful drug addict.”
Plasencia also spoke before the sentencing, breaking into tears as he imagined the day he would have to tell his now two-year-old son “about the time I didn’t protect another mother’s son. It hurts me so much.”
He apologized directly to Perry’s family. “I should have protected him,” he said.
In July, Plasencia pleaded guilty to four counts of distribution of ketamine. Plasencia was the first to be sentenced of the five defendants who have pleaded guilty in connection with Perry’s death.
In August, Jasveen Sangha, a woman known as the “Ketamine Queen”, agreed to plead guilty to one count of maintaining a drug-involved premises, three counts of distribution of ketamine, and one count of distribution of ketamine resulting in death. She is set to be sentenced later this month, where she could face up to 65 years in prison.
The other three defendants will be sentenced at their own hearings in the coming months.
Perry spoke candidly about his addiction struggles over the years, writing in his 2022 memoir Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing, that his alcoholism began as a teenager, and that he became addicted to painkillers after a jet-skiing accident in 1997. Following his death, Perry’s family established the Matthew Perry Foundation, which aims to create “a future free of addiction stigmas, where everyone has the resources and opportunities to thrive in their recovery journey”.
