Matthew Perry asked his longtime assistant to give him three doses of ketamine on the day he died, and his final words reveal just how reliant he had become on the drug.
According to court documents obtained by NBC News on Thursday, Perry asked his longtime assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, for a “big hit” — another dose of a dissociative anesthetic — just before he was found face-down and unresponsive in a hot tub at his home on Oct. 28, 2023.
The information was gathered after the 59-year-old Iwamasa and four others were indicted in connection with Iwamasa’s death on Thursday afternoon.
According to the documents, Perry, who died at age 54, asked Iwamasa to administer his first dose of ketamine at 8:30 a.m. on Oct. 28. Perry received his second dose about four hours later while watching a movie at his $5.2 million Los Angeles mansion.
Iwamasa then asked Perry to give him a third injection and prepare the jacuzzi. Following his boss’ instructions, Iwamasa left Perry’s house to run some errands. When he returned, Perry had passed away.
The beloved Friends star had previously revealed that he had been using ketamine to treat depression, but had been abusing the drug in the month prior to his death.
According to Iwamasa’s plea agreement, he administered ketamine, a drug used as an anesthetic to relieve patients’ pain, to Perry for about a month.
According to prosecutors, Dr. Salvador Plasencia, 42, taught Iwamasa how to administer the drugs after meeting with Perry around the end of September 2023. The doctor allegedly provided Iwamasa with liquid ketamine and lozenges.
Although Perry was receiving regular ketamine treatments from a doctor (his last official dose was two weeks before his death), he instructed his assistant to continue purchasing the drugs from Plascencia and from a man later named Eric Fleming, both of whom were indicted.
Additionally, Plascencia is accused of conspiring with Dr. Mark Chavez, 54, to provide Perry with more ketamine in an attempt to make quick money.
“How much will this idiot pay,” he allegedly texted Chavez.
Perry is believed to have paid the two men $55,000 in cash for ketamine just weeks before his death.
Plascencia was well aware of Perry’s troubled relationship with narcotics: Just days before his death, he reportedly told another person that the “Fools Rush In” star was “spiralling out of control with narcotics addiction.”
He also administered ketamine to the actor on October 12, knowing full well that he had just received the drug from his doctor, and witnessed his body “freeze and his blood pressure spike.”
Perry has struggled with substance abuse throughout her adult life and opened up about her use of ketamine in her 2022 memoir, “Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing: A Memoir.”
He described the drug as having his name “written all over it” and acknowledged that it helped him “disconnect” from life. He also said the drug made him feel like he was “dying.”
He added: “Drinking K was like being hit over the head with a giant, happy shovel, except the hangover was worse than the blow of the shovel.”
In November 2022, the “17 Again” actor said on the “Q with Tom Power” podcast that he wants to be remembered as “someone who lived well, loved well, (and) was a seeker.”
“And his biggest desire is to help people, which is what I want.”
