Kenneth Iwamasa, Matthew Perry's former live-in personal assistant, was sentenced on Wednesday to 41 months in federal prison for conspiring to distribute the ketamine that caused the Friends actor's death. The 61-year-old admitted repeatedly injecting Perry without medical training, including the fatal dose that left him face down in a hot tub at his Pacific Palisades home on 28 October 2023.
He is the fifth and final defendant to be sentenced following a multi-year federal investigation into how those around the star enabled his ketamine use.
Iwamasa pleaded guilty in August 2024 to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine resulting in death. He was the first to enter a plea and subsequently cooperated with prosecutors, helping secure convictions against the other four people involved.
These included two doctors who supplied ketamine and taught him injection techniques, a drug counsellor and the so-called Ketamine Queen supplier. Prosecutors said Iwamasa helped obtain more than £37,200 ($50,000) worth of the drug in the weeks before Perry's death as per a BBC report.
Despite being paid £111,600 ($150,000) a year to coordinate medical care and support sobriety, he became what they called Perry's 'enabler and drug supplier'.
Admissions in court showed Iwamasa injected Perry six to eight times a day at times in the final period and gave him at least three shots on the day he died usingketamine from supplier Jasveen Sangha. He had witnessed the actor suffer adverse reactions, including freezing up after a large dose, and found him unconscious on previous occasions.
After discovering Perry unresponsive in the hot tub, Iwamasa called 911 but omitted any reference to ketamine when speaking to police. He then removed vials and syringes from the scene, deleted messages and later told a co-conspirator that he had 'cleaned up the scene' and 'deleted everything'.
Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett later highlighted this reckless conduct and his knowledge of Perry's addiction struggles.
In victim impact statements read to the court, Perry's mother Suzanne Morrison said the family had 'trusted a man without a conscience, and my son paid the price'. His half-sister Madeline Morrison described Iwamasa as 'the monster that killed him' and expressed shock that he had spoken at the funeral.
Perry's stepfather and business manager also addressed the betrayal of trust. Iwamasa, speaking directly to the family as reported by NBC, said: 'I'm just so sorry to have done illegal acts that I will forever regret. I will take that to my grave.'
Source: International Business Times UK
