A California physician accused of giving Buddies star Matthew Perry entry to ketamine within the weeks earlier than the actor’s overdose dying has agreed to plead responsible, in keeping with federal prosecutors.
Dr Salvador Plasencia will plead responsible to 4 counts of distributing ketamine, federal prosecutors mentioned in a press release on Monday. The plea carries a most sentence of 40 years in jail and the physician is anticipated to make his plea within the coming weeks.
Perry – finest identified for enjoying Chandler Bing on Buddies – was discovered lifeless in his scorching tub in Los Angeles in October 2023. He was 54 and though he’d been open about struggles with despair and dependancy, followers all over the world had been shocked by his dying.
In accordance with textual content messages shared with prosecutors from Dr Mark Chavez – a physician who already pleaded responsible within the case – Dr Plasencia known as Perry a “moron” and puzzled how a lot he’d be prepared to pay for the medication.
In accordance with paperwork filed for the plea settlement, Dr Plasencia injected Perry with ketamine at his residence and within the car parking zone of the Lengthy Seashore Aquarium. Dr Plasencia taught Perry’s assistant – who can be a defendant – the right way to administer the drug and would promote further vials for them to maintain at residence, in keeping with the plea deal.
The physician is one in every of 5 folks charged with what prosecutors allege was an underground community of sellers and medical professionals who provided Perry with ketamine. The actor was taking authorized, prescribed quantities of the drug to deal with his despair, however needed greater than what was prescribed.
In complete, the plea settlement says, between 30 September 2023, and 12 October 2023, Dr Plasencia bought twenty 5ml (100mg/ml) vials of ketamine, lower than a full package deal of ketamine lozenges, and syringes to Perry and his assistant.
Dr Plasencia’s attorneys couldn’t be instantly reached for remark.
