Matthew Perry Death, Charges Against 2 Doctors, 'Ketamine Queen' and Personal Assistant | TMZ Live
Law enforcement authorities say a broad, underground criminal network was responsible for supplying Matthew Perry with the ketamine that led to his death.
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00:00So we broke a story early this morning, that there have been arrests made in the death of Matthew Perry.
00:06The death caused really by ketamine, illegally obtained ketamine.
00:11And among the people arrested, doctors and a woman called the Ketamine Queen.
00:18In all, the authorities said that five people have been charged.
00:23And those five people, like you said, include two doctors,
00:27Dr. Salvador Placencia, Dr. Mark Chavez, and then Matthew's personal assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa.
00:35By the way, he is the man who found Matthew Perry in the hot tub.
00:40Yes, and then there's the Ketamine Queen, Jasveen Sangha.
00:44So the authorities came out, when we say the authorities, by the way,
00:47talking about the Feds, the DEA was involved here, LAPD,
00:52U.S. Postal Service, U.S. Attorney,
00:55they were all involved in this, and there's a news conference this morning
00:58where they laid out some of the details that led to these arrests.
01:03And they have text messages between some of the defendants.
01:08And you will see the callousness of these people, allegedly,
01:15basically saying, we will do anything for money knowing that Matthew Perry was in the throes of addiction
01:22from September until his death, October 28th.
01:25They were supplying him with a shocking amount of ketamine.
01:29Here is a little bit from the news conference.
01:32Over two months, from September to October 2023,
01:36they distributed approximately 20 vials of ketamine to Mr. Perry
01:42in exchange for $55,000 in cash.
01:48Defendant Placentia saw this as an opportunity to profit off of Mr. Perry.
01:53He wrote in a text message in September 2023,
01:57quote, I wonder how much this moron will pay.
02:01That is just unbelievable.
02:03By the way, that text continued, they said, let's find out how much he'll pay.
02:08So they did a bunch of raids on some of these homes.
02:13And what they found is just shocking.
02:16In particular, at the Ketamine Queen, Jasveen Sangha, 80 vials of ketamine,
02:26thousands of pills of meth, cocaine, drug paraphernalia, Xanax.
02:33I mean, it was, they called it an emporium of drugs.
02:37So all of them have been charged.
02:40Turns out two of them, including Matthew Perry's personal assistant,
02:44they have already copped pleas in the case,
02:47which means that what they were really doing was they were cooperating with authorities
02:53in order to get lighter sentences and get the big fish.
02:57But obviously the big fish they seem to be after are the two doctors and the Ketamine Queen.
03:03That's exactly right.
03:04Actually, one of the doctors has already entered a plea deal as well.
03:07So really this case is going to revolve around that Dr. Placentia and Jasveen Sangha,
03:11known as the Ketamine Queen.
03:12And some of the details in this indictment are not only callous, but they're very tragic
03:16because in the four days preceding Matthew Perry's death in late October,
03:21they received 25 vials of ketamine.
03:24And Iwamasa is accused of injecting Perry with more than 20 shots of ketamine
03:33over the next four days, ultimately resulting in his death.
03:36So it's a really, really sad sequence of events.
03:40And the cover-up afterwards, the prosecutors also say that Sangha was texting
03:44in the wake of learning about Matthew's death, delete all of our messages.
03:47So they were aware that they were going to be caught up in this criminal investigation,
03:51and here it is.
03:52Also, guys, you know what's interesting about this investigation?
03:54It's reaching the circles of Hollywood, and there are other celebrities that are involved in this.
03:58I don't know whether they are receiving the drugs, but they know,
04:01and there's only so many people that are in the Hollywood world where you can get your drugs from,
04:05and the police know about this, and they were on to this.
04:07We did interview somebody, you know, that we said they interviewed somebody
04:10and pulled search warrants on their phone and their computer to get information.
04:13We should get into that because we have told you that Brooke Mueller,
04:18who is Charlie Sheen's ex-wife, she was at a recovery center in March
04:24where the feds served her with a search warrant, and they seized her cell phone and her computer.
04:32Now, she has not been arrested, she has not been charged, but for whatever reason...
04:37There was something there that led them to other people.
04:41And the one thing we know and have reported is that she was actually in a recovery center
04:48with Matthew Perry at one point where they were both struggling with their addiction
04:53and trying to recover, so there was some connection.
04:56Now, again, we don't know why this search warrant was signed by a judge
05:01because you have to show some kind of probable cause.
05:03We do know that she has not been charged, but like Dennis just said,
05:09this goes beyond Matthew Perry, and we've seen it too with Mac Miller.
05:12They are going after these people now.
05:14I mean, it's very clear, and they said this in the news conference,
05:16the U.S. attorney said that they are going to be going after people who are,
05:21if they have evidence, that they are distributing drugs that are being administered
05:25in a way that is leading to someone's death, they're going to go after you.
05:29And by the way, help me out here.
05:31Oh, the potential sentence?
05:33Right, that's what I was... I think it was 120 years.
05:35120 years, I believe, for one of the doctors and the other, the ketamine queen,
05:40they said could face life in prison if convicted. Life in prison.
05:45And remember, they did this with Mac Miller. I believe the dealer there got 11 years.
05:49This is way more serious in terms of just prison time.
05:55And again, they've not been convicted at all, but it is very clear the feds mean business,
06:01and it seems like what Dennis said, which they are unearthing things
06:05that go way beyond Matthew Perry.
06:08My name is Brianna, and I'm from Ventura County.
06:11I still struggle to accept that Matthew Perry is no longer with us,
06:15and it's so upsetting to think that people were enabling his addiction
06:19in order to profit off of it.
06:21I'm glad that arrests have been made, and I hope that justice is served.
06:25They deserve to go to jail.
06:27I've got to tell you, did you read Matthew Perry's book?
06:30I did not.
06:31I read it, and the struggle that he went through over his lifetime
06:37is just... it's hard to even imagine the pain that he went through.
06:43It's sad that there were... but he was also very public about it.
06:47So this wasn't a secret, and the U.S. Attorney said this,
06:51that this is not a secret to any of these people who are dealing with Matthew Perry
06:54that he was addicted, and they, instead of being sensitive to that,
06:59they were allegedly preying on that.
07:02And not just that, by the way.
07:04They knew that he had fallen off the wagon in September,
07:07and they were fueling him and fueling him and fueling him until he died.
07:11There was another text message in there from Iwamasa, the personal assistant.
07:17According to the prosecutors, they say that he texted someone,
07:21if he likes this shipment of ketamine, he's going to want all of the supply.
07:26So there's someone, the personal assistant,
07:31who was allegedly just fueling this at every step.
07:34That's just unbelievable.