Matthew Perry’s Assistant Sentenced for Injecting Actor With Fatal Ketamine Dose

Kenneth Iwamasa was sentenced to almost three and a half years in prison for his role in the death of Matthew Perry. Iwamasa was Perry’s live-in assistant and administered three ketamine doses on October 23, 2023 that proved fatal. He was also fined $10,000. Although Iwamasa was the final defendant to be sentenced in Perry’s death, he was the first to plea out. According to Deadline, Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett noted that “there is no hard evidence that he acted with malicious intent, though some would disagree.”

In April, Jasveen Sangha, also known as the Ketamine Queen, was sentenced to 15 years for distributing the ketamine that killed Perry. She and Bel-Air treatment-center program director Erik Fleming sold Perry 51 vials of ketamine, which Iwamasa administered at Perry’s request. Iwamasa says the actor’s last words were “Shoot me up with a big one” before getting in the hot tub in which he was later found dead.

Hollywood was divided on whether or not the power imbalance between Perry and Iwamasa made him culpable in the Friends star’s death. Vanity Fair published an article in September 2024 arguing that assistants have no choice but to go through with their bosses’ wishes, regardless of their personal ethics. Judge Garnett disagreed. She found that his close personal relationship with Perry (having been friends since 1992 and a live-in assistant since 2022) gave Iwamasa plenty of opportunity to intervene. “Your conduct was reckless,” she said, “not just on the day of his death but in the days leading up to his death.”