The Friends star Matthew Perry ordered his live-in personal assistant to give him several intravenous doses of ketamine on the day of his death last year, according to a statement by the assistant to investigators.
The actor, who was found drowned in a hot tub at his Los Angeles home last October, asked his assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, to give him a dose at 8.30am, according to court papers.
Four hours later, while he watched a movie at his home, he asked Iwamasa to give him another shot. Then just 40 minutes after that, Perry directed him to give him a larger dose.
“Shoot me up with a big one,” Perry told Iwamasa, and instructed him to get the hot tub ready. The assistant gave Perry the dose and left the home to run errands, the papers say. When he returned, Perry was face-down in the water.
An autopsy report by the Los Angeles county medical examiner later recorded that Perry, 54, had died of “acute effects of ketamine” and that he had drowned in “the heated end of his pool”.
Ketamine is an anaesthetic that is often used recreationally, as well as to treat depression. Buprenorphine, an opioid often used to treat those addicted to heroin, also contributed to Perry’s death, the report found.
The arrest of five people on Thursday in connection with Perry’s death, including Iwamasa; two doctors, Mark Chavez and Salvador Plasencia; and the drug dealers Jasveen Sangha, AKA “the Ketamine Queen”, and Erik Fleming, has exposed a world of high-end drug dealing to the stars.
According to a timeline constructed from police reports, Perry’s last days were punctuated by an escalating search for the drug. Federal prosecutors allege that the five people charged “took advantage of Mr Perry’s addiction to enrich themselves”.
Law enforcement officials have said that Perry became increasingly reliant on ketamine, and had turned to illegal dealers after his request to a local clinic was denied.
The actor’s increasing dependence on the drug in some ways mirrors the death of the singer Michael Jackson, who had become dependent on a pseudo-legitimate dose of another anaesthetic, propofol.
Reports have detailed signs that Perry’s dependence had become life-threatening: he was found on several previous occasions unconscious and had been observed to lose his ability to speak or move after a dose.
According to Iwamasa’s statement, part of his job was to coordinate Perry’s doctor’s appointments and to ensure he took his medications. Iwamasa said he was introduced to Plasencia as a source for the drugs.
Plasencia had at one point discussed with the other doctor charged in the case, Chavez, how much money they could make from Perry, according to court documents.
“I wonder how much this moron will pay,” Plasencia texted Chavez. Prosecutors allege Chavez supplied 22 vials of ketamine and ketamine lozenges through a fraudulent prescription. Chavez allegedly replied: “Lets find out.”