Kenneth Iwamasa, the man Matthew Perry trusted to guard him against addiction, was sentenced Wednesday in Los Angeles federal court to three years and five months in prison for administering the ketamine injections that killed the beloved actor. Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett handed down the sentence, matching prosecutors' request, along with two years of probation and a $10,000 fine, the New York Post reported.
Iwamasa, 60, was the last of five people sentenced in the sprawling federal investigation into Perry's October 2023 death. He pleaded guilty in August 2024 to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine resulting in death. He will report to custody on July 17.
The sentencing closes a case that exposed a grim supply chain, a physician who injected Perry in a parked car outside a Long Beach aquarium, a supplier who furnished dozens of vials and lozenges, a convicted drug dealer known as the "Ketamine Queen," and a Hollywood producer who brokered introductions. At the center of it all stood the personal assistant who lived under Perry's roof, earned his trust, and pushed the plunger.
Perry's stepfather, "Dateline NBC" correspondent Keith Morrison, fought back tears as he addressed Iwamasa directly from the witness stand. His words carried the weight of a family that had believed Iwamasa was a protector, not a threat.
"You were part of the family. You could have called someone. You kept injecting him."
Morrison did not stop there. He told the courtroom that Iwamasa had been "living a dandy life. Like a king", enjoying the privileges of Perry's household while feeding the actor's fatal habit. AP News reported that Judge Garnett echoed that assessment, telling Iwamasa from the bench: "Your conduct was reckless, not just on the day of his death but in the days leading up to his death."
Iwamasa appeared stoic in a grey suit for most of the hearing but seemed on the verge of tears during Morrison's statement. When he spoke, he offered a brief apology: "I'm so sorry to all of you. Matthew loved you." He said he would take the mistake to his grave.
Suzanne Perry, the actor's mother, delivered a victim impact statement that laid bare the human cost behind the legal proceedings. She described the trust the family had placed in Iwamasa, and the catastrophic result.
"Kenny's most important job, by far, was to be my son's companion and guardian in his fight against addiction. We trusted a man without a conscience, and my son paid the price."
She then recounted the night her son was found dead in his backyard at age 54. The scene she described was devastating in its specificity.
"One night he was just a body, lying all but naked on the cold damp grass of his backyard. Helicopters circled overhead, eager for a glimpse of my dead little boy. I stood out on the street in the cold and begged for a blanket to cover him. Impossible, of course."
Later, at the morgue, she said Perry "had been bathed and dressed and he looked almost beautiful and somehow relieved, like a gladiator who has finally earned his rest."
Perry's sister, Madeline Morrison, also addressed the court. Fox News reported that she told the courtroom Iwamasa "was injecting my brother with a lethal dose of ketamine and left him in a hot tub to die."
Iwamasa did not act alone. Federal prosecutors assembled a case against five individuals who played distinct roles in keeping Perry supplied with ketamine in the weeks and days before his death.
The chain began with Dr. Salvador Plasencia, 43, a physician who injected Perry in the back seat of a car parked at a public parking lot outside a Long Beach aquarium. Mark Chavez, 55, another supplier, later reprimanded Plasencia for dosing Perry in a public place where children were present. Plasencia was sentenced December 3 to two and a half years in prison. Chavez, who admitted to supplying 22 vials and nine lozenges of ketamine, received eight months of home confinement on December 16.
Federal cases involving networks of enablers around vulnerable individuals have drawn increased scrutiny in recent years, as courts have pursued accountability across a range of conspiracy prosecutions.
Erik Fleming, a 56-year-old former Hollywood producer and director, introduced Perry to Jasveen Sangha just two weeks before the actor's death. Fleming pleaded guilty in connection with the overdose and was sentenced May 12 to two years in prison.
Sangha, the drug dealer referred to as the "Ketamine Queen," received the harshest sentence of anyone in the case: 15 years in federal prison, handed down on April 8. At her sentencing, Morrison addressed Sangha directly, saying, "I feel bad for you, Miss Sangha. I don't hate you.... You are a drug dealer." Sangha said she "took full responsibility for her crimes" and that she "had the 'rug of life ripped out' from under" her.
Iwamasa cooperated with investigators throughout their probe, a factor that likely influenced the sentence prosecutors sought. Newsmax reported that Iwamasa initially lied to police and destroyed evidence before eventually becoming prosecutors' key informant. That cooperation helped build the cases against the other four defendants.
But cooperation did not erase what Iwamasa did. Fox News reported that in the days immediately before Perry's death, between October 24 and October 27, 2023, Iwamasa injected Perry with ketamine six to eight times daily. He was the last person to see Perry alive and the one who found him dead in his hot tub.
Morrison, Perry's stepfather, described the actor as "a brilliant and talented man" who should have "had another act." Instead, Perry died at 54, surrounded by people who profited from his addiction or lacked the courage to stop it.
With Iwamasa's sentencing, all five defendants in the Perry case have now faced a judge. The sentences span a wide range:
The disparity tells its own story. Sangha, the dealer who supplied the drug, drew the longest term. Chavez, who furnished 22 vials and nine lozenges of ketamine, will serve his sentence at home. The physician who injected a patient in a parking lot received less time than the assistant who injected him at home.
Whether these sentences adequately reflect the gravity of what happened is a question Perry's family has answered with their presence in every courtroom, at every hearing, speaking directly to every defendant.
Perry's death exposed something uglier than one man's relapse. It revealed a market, part medical, part criminal, built around a celebrity's addiction. A licensed physician supplied the drug. A personal assistant administered it. A producer made introductions. A dealer kept the pipeline flowing. Each collected some benefit from the arrangement. Perry collected a coffin.
The federal investigation moved with unusual speed and breadth, charging not just the street-level dealer but the professionals and insiders who made the supply chain possible. That approach sent a message: proximity to a victim does not confer immunity, and a medical license does not excuse complicity.
Suzanne Perry's words will outlast the sentencing memos. She trusted a man to keep her son alive. He kept injecting him instead. The law has now spoken on all five defendants. Whether three years and five months is justice for the man who held the needle, that verdict belongs to the family that buried Matthew Perry.
When the people closest to an addict become the pipeline instead of the guardrail, no sentence will feel long enough to the ones left standing at the graveside.
