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A doctor sentenced to 30 months in prison for selling ketamine to Matthew Perry is appealling his sentence, arguing he was operating as a drug dealer — not a physician — when he sold the drug to the late star of Friends.
According to a defence brief obtained by CBC News, lawyers for 44-year-old Dr. Salvador Plasencia argued he unfairly received a harsher sentence than fellow defendants Mark Chavez and Erik Fleming. They claim Plasencia was “punished more severely on account of his professional status even though he did not abuse his position of trust or use a special skill,” when selling ketamine to Perry.
The brief argues that Plasencia, who was sentenced on Dec. 3 after pleading guilty to four counts of ketamine distribution, was “not acting as a physician.”
“Instead, he was nothing more than a drug dealer, similar to the role played by defendants Chavez and Flemming.”
Perry saw Plasencia “for what he was in this case, namely, a drug dealer who happened to have an ‘M.D.’ after his name,” the brief states. “There was no fiduciary relationship in existence and Perry did not grant appellant any discretion as a treating physician.”
In the brief, Plasencia’s lawyers acknowledge that medical doctors hold positions of trust and possess specialized skills, but argue that “these attributes must be shown to have ‘contributed in some significant way,'” to the offence, a standard they say does not apply in this case.
They call the ruling judge’s emphasis on Plasencia’s status as a physician “misguided,” arguing that his credentials “were not integral to the commission of the drug crimes.”
The 54-year-old actor, best known for playing Chandler Bing on the hit sitcom Friends was found dead in the hot tub of the home he shared with his personal assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, in October 2023, after suffering a fatal ketamine overdose.
According to court filings, Iwamasa purchased the drugs and administered some of the injections, with Perry reportedly telling him to “shoot me up with a big one” the day that he died.
Court documents reveal that Plasencia admitted to distributing the vials of ketamine to Perry and Iwamasa in the days prior to the actor’s death. Before one meeting with Perry on Sept. 30, 2023, Plasencia texted Chavez, who had agreed to obtain the ketamine, writing, “I wonder how much this moron will pay.”
WATCH | Perry ‘wanted to live,’ manager says:
Matthew Perry’s live-in personal assistant was sentenced Wednesday to three years and five months in prison in connection with his death from a ketamine overdose in 2023. Outside the courthouse, Kenneth Iwamasa’s attorney said his client was the victim of an imbalanced power dynamic, while Perry’s manager said the actor ‘wanted to live.’
