The San Diego doctor charged in connection with Matthew Perry’s overdose pleaded guilty Wednesday to conspiracy to distribute surgical ketamine.
Dr. Mark Chavez, 54, entered federal court in Los Angeles, becoming the third person to plead guilty after the verdict. Friends star’s death last year.
Prosecutors gave Chavez and two others lesser charges in exchange for their cooperation as they went after two targets they believed were responsible for the overdose death: another doctor and a suspected trafficker who they said was known as the “queen of ketamine” in Los Angeles. Angeles.
Chavez is free on bond pending sentencing. He has turned in his passport and agreed to surrender his medical license, among other conditions.
His lawyer, Matthew Binninger, said after Chavez’s first court appearance on August 30 that he was “very remorseful” and “trying to do everything in his power to right the wrong that happened here.”
Also cooperating with federal prosecutors are Perry’s assistant, who admitted helping him obtain and inject ketamine, and Perry’s friend, who admitted working as a drug courier and middleman.
These three help the prosecutors as they pursue their main targets: Dr. Salvador Plasencia, who is accused of illegally selling ketamine to Perry a month before his death, and Jasveen Sangha, who is suspected of being the dealer who sold the actress the fatal dose. Both have pleaded not guilty and are awaiting trial.
Chavez could face up to 10 years in prison
Chavez admitted in his plea that he obtained ketamine from his former clinic and wholesale distributor to whom he sent a forged prescription.
He can be sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Perry was found dead by his assistant on October 28, 2023. The medical examiner determined that ketamine was the primary cause of death. The actor has been using this drug through his general practitioner for the legal but off-label treatment of widespread depression.
Perry began to seek more ketamine than his doctor would give him. About a month before the actor’s death, he found Plasencia, who was said to have asked Chavez to get him the drug.
“I wonder how much this bastard is going to pay,” Placencia texted Chavez, according to court documents from prosecutors. The two met on the same day in Costa Mesa, between Los Angeles and San Diego, and exchanged at least four vials of ketamine, documents said.
After selling the drugs to Perry for $4,500 US, Plasencia allegedly asked Chavez if he could continue to supply them so that they would “go with Perry,” prosecutors said.
US Attorney Martin Estrada said when announcing the charges on August 15 that “doctors took Perry’s history of addiction in the last months of his life last year to give him ketamine in amounts they knew to be dangerous.”
Perry battled addiction for years, starting with his time Friendswhen he became one of the biggest stars of his generation as Chandler Bing. He starred alongside Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc and David Schwimmer for 10 seasons from 1994 to 2004 on NBC’s megahit sitcom.
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