A La Jolla doctor is among five people charged in connection with the death of former “Friends” actor Matthew Perry in what prosecutors called a “broad underground criminal network” dedicated to getting Perry the powerful surgical anesthetic that killed him.
According to Los Angeles-area U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada, two doctors, including Mark Chavez, 54, preyed on Perry’s history of addiction in the final months of his life last year to provide him with ketamine in amounts they knew were dangerous.
A landlord told Fox-TV/5 that Chavez rents a room in her La Jolla home.
“They knew what they were doing was wrong,” Estrada said. “They knew what they were doing was risking great danger to Mr. Perry. But they did it anyway.”
Prosecutors allege that while the doctors conspired to provide Perry with several doses of ketamine in the weeks before his death, the lethal dose was provided by a drug dealer known to customers as the “Ketamine Queen.”
Chavez, who calls himself “The Health MD” and describes himself as an author, an entrepreneur and a personal health coach, has agreed to plead guilty to a felony charge of conspiracy to distribute ketamine. His plea agreement, signed last month and filed Aug. 15 in federal court in Los Angeles, indicated that Chavez has been cooperating for months with federal authorities investigating Perry’s death.
Chavez faces up to 10 years in prison when sentenced.
Chavez admitted in his plea agreement that he sold ketamine to Dr. Salvador Plasencia of Santa Monica, who then injected Perry with the drug on multiple occasions. Chavez said in the plea agreement that he knew he was obtaining ketamine for “a well-known actor.”
According to his plea agreement, Chavez diverted ketamine from his former ketamine clinic and submitted a fraudulent prescription in the name of an unwitting former patient. He obtained additional doses by making false representations to wholesale distributors.
According to his plea, investigators from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the Medical Board of California interviewed Chavez about the phony prescription nine days before Perry’s death, but Chavez lied to them about what happened to the drugs.
Chavez and his attorney did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Perry died Oct. 28 at his Pacific Palisades home due to a ketamine overdose, and prosecutors said he received several injections on the day he died from his live-in personal assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, who found Perry dead later that day and was the first to talk to investigators.
Plasencia and Jasveen Sangha, whom prosecutors described as the “Ketamine Queen,” were arrested Aug. 15, Estrada said.
Iwamasa pleaded guilty to charges earlier this month, as did Erik Fleming, who pleaded guilty to obtaining the drug from Sangha and delivering it to Iwamasa.
Ketamine has seen a huge surge in use in recent years as a treatment for depression, anxiety and pain. Though the drug isn’t approved for those conditions, doctors are free to prescribe drugs for so-called off-label uses.
Perry had been receiving regular ketamine infusion treatments for depression — in amounts not nearly enough to account for his death — from his regular doctors, who were not among those charged, authorities said.
When those doctors refused to give him more, he went in desperation to others.
“We are not talking about legitimate ketamine treatment,” Estrada said. “We’re talking about two doctors who abused the trust they had, abused their licenses to put another person’s life at risk.” ♦
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