Doctor who helped supply Matthew Perry with ketamine pleads guilty to drug charge

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Doctor who helped supply Matthew Perry with ketamine pleads guilty to drug charge

时间：2024-10-03 06:55 来源：未知作者：admin 阅读：次

In short:

Mark Chavez has pleaded guilty to conspiring to distribute ketamine to the now-deceased American actor Matthew Perry.

The 54-year-old San Diego doctor is the third person to admit guilt in the aftermath of Perry's fatal overdose last year.

What's next?

Prosecutors offered lesser charges in exchange for his cooperation as they go after two targets they deem more responsible for Perry's death.

A San Diego doctor charged in connection with Matthew Perry's fatal overdose has pleaded guilty to conspiring to distribute the surgical anaesthetic ketamine.

Mark Chavez entered the plea to the felony in federal court in Los Angeles on Wednesday, local time, becoming the third person to admit guilt in the aftermath of the Friends star's death last year.

Prosecutors offered lesser charges to the 54-year-old and two others in exchange for their cooperation as they go after two targets they deem more responsible for the overdose death: another doctor and an alleged dealer that they say was known as "ketamine queen" of Los Angeles.

Dr Chavez is free on bond until the sentencing.

He has turned over his passport and agreed to surrender his medical license, among other conditions.

After Dr Chavez's first court appearance, his lawyer Matthew Binninger said his client was "incredibly remorseful" and is "trying to do everything in his power to right the wrong that happened here".

Also working with federal prosecutors are Perry's assistant, who admitted to helping him obtain and inject ketamine, and a Perry acquaintance, who admitted to acting as a drug messenger and middleman.

The three are helping prosecutors as they go after their main targets: Salvador Plasencia, a doctor charged with illegally selling ketamine to Perry in the month before his death, and Jasveen Sangha, alleged to be a dealer who sold the actor the lethal dose.

Mark Chavez is the third person to admit guilt in the aftermath of Matthew Perry's death last year.

Both have pleaded not guilty and are awaiting trial.

Dr Chavez admitted in his plea agreement that he obtained ketamine from his former clinic and from a wholesale distributor where he submitted a fraudulent prescription.

Under the law, he could get up to 10 years in prison when he's sentenced in April next year, but is likely to be sentenced to far less because of the plea and his cooperation with prosecutors.

'Doctors preyed on Perry's history of addiction'

Perry was found dead by his assistant on October 28, 2023, with the medical examiner ruling that ketamine was the primary cause of death.

The actor had been using the drug through his regular doctor in a legal but off-label treatment for depression that has become increasingly common.

Perry began seeking more ketamine than his doctor would give him.

About a month before the actor's death, he found Dr Plasencia, who in turn allegedly asked Dr Chavez to obtain the drug for him.

"I wonder how much this moron will pay," Dr Plasencia texted Dr Chavez, according to court filings from prosecutors.

The two met up the same day in Costa Mesa, halfway between Los Angeles and San Diego, and exchanged at least four vials of ketamine, the filings said.

After selling the drugs to Perry for $US4,500 ($6500), Dr Plasencia allegedly asked Dr Chavez if he could keep supplying them so they could become Perry's "go-to," prosecutors said.

US Attorney Martin Estrada said, while announcing the charges, that "the doctors 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".

Perry struggled with addiction for years, dating back to his time on Friends, when he became one of the biggest stars of his generation as Chandler Bing.

Wires

By：https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-10-03/doctor-who-helped-supply-matthew-perry-ketamine-pleads-guilty/104425960

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