Additional Coverage:
- Matthew Perry’s doctor sobs as he’s sentenced to prison for supplying actor with ketamine (irishstar.com)
Doctor Sentenced in Matthew Perry’s Death, Parents Express Outrage
LOS ANGELES – Dr. Salvador Plasencia, the physician who supplied actor Matthew Perry with illegal substances, has been sentenced to two and a half years in prison after pleading guilty to four counts of ketamine distribution. Perry, best known for his role on “Friends,” died at age 54 on October 28, 2023, from the “acute effects of ketamine” after being found unconscious in a jacuzzi at his Los Angeles home.
Dr. Plasencia admitted to providing Perry with controlled substances over approximately two months, specifically in September and October 2023.
His legal representative, Karen Goldstein, stated, “Dr. Plasencia is profoundly remorseful for the treatment decisions he made while providing ketamine to Matthew Perry.
He is fully accepting responsibility by pleading guilty to drug distribution.”
In court, Dr. Plasencia offered a heartfelt apology to Perry’s family, acknowledging his role in the circumstances that contributed to the actor’s death.
“I failed Mr. Perry – I failed him.
I failed his family. There is no excuse.
I’m just so sorry,” he stated, as reported by The New York Times.
Matthew Perry’s mother, Suzanne, and stepfather, Keith Morrison, delivered a powerful victim impact statement prior to the sentencing. Their statement, included in a victim impact report at the United States Courthouse in Los Angeles, condemned Plasencia and others as “jackals” who exploited their son before his untimely passing.
“I believe the man you are going to sentence today is among the most culpable of all,” the statement read. “His crime I find truly hard to understand.
Here was a man who’d studied for years and years, poured sweat and tears, I imagine, into his quest to become a doctor. A long road with a narrow gate, to enter that esteemed profession.
Why become a doctor? To cure the sick of course.
To heal people. To save lives.
I imagine too that the most important and sacred promise he ever made was the Hippocratic oath… that ancient vow to, first, do no harm.”
They continued, expressing their disbelief that a doctor would violate such sacred vows: “Sometimes it’s a little easier to understand when a person commits a terrible crime. Maybe in the heat of passion, or because that person makes one very bad decision..
Or some drug dealer, bad to the bone, who takes the calculated risk of getting caught and spending many years in prison. But…a doctor?
Who trades on respect, and trust? And not just one bad decision.
No one alive and in touch with the world at all could have been unaware of Matthew’s struggles.”
The statement concluded with a scathing indictment of Plasencia’s actions: “But this doctor conspired to break his most important vows, repeatedly, sneaked through the night to meet his victim in secret. For what, a few thousand dollars?
So he could feed on the vulnerability of our son…and crow, as he did so, with that revealing question: ‘I wonder how much this moron will pay. Let’s find out.'”
Plasencia is one of five individuals who have confessed to providing Perry with narcotics, a group that also includes 42-year-old British citizen Jasveen Sangha, reportedly known as the “ketamine queen.”