By Lisa Richwine
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -The Los Angeles drug dealer known as the “Ketamine Queen” was due in court on Wednesday to plead guilty to charges that she supplied the dose of the prescription anesthetic that killed “Friends” star Matthew Perry.
Jasveen Sangha, 42, who has acknowledged in court documents that she ran a “stash house” for illegal narcotics, reached an agreement with federal prosecutors last month to plead guilty to five felony counts stemming from Perry’s overdose death in 2023.
Sangha, a dual U.S.-British citizen, could face a prison term of up to 65 years when she is sentenced at a future court hearing. She is the last of the five suspects charged in the case to plead guilty rather than stand trial.
Her four co-defendants – two physicians, Perry’s personal assistant and another man who admitted to acting as an intermediary in selling ketamine to the actor – are also awaiting sentencing.
According to federal prosecutors, Sangha has agreed to plead guilty to one count of maintaining a drug-involved premises, plus three counts of illegal distribution of ketamine and one count of distributing ketamine resulting in death.
Medical examiners concluded that Perry died from acute effects of ketamine, which combined with other factors to cause the actor to lose consciousness and drown in his hot tub on October 28, 2023. He was 54 years old.
Perry had publicly acknowledged decades of substance abuse, including periods that overlapped with the height of his fame playing the sardonic but charming Chandler Bing on the 1990s hit NBC television comedy “Friends.”
Ketamine, a short-acting anesthetic with hallucinogenic properties, is prescribed to treat depression and anxiety, but it also has gained popularity as an illicit party drug among recreational users.
According to Sangha’s plea agreement as outlined by the Justice Department, Sangha had supplied 51 vials of ketamine from her stash house to a go-between dealer, Erik Fleming, 55, who in turn sold the doses to Perry through his live-in personal assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, 60.
It was Iwamasa, prosecutors said, who later injected Perry with at least three shots of ketamine from the vials Sangha supplied, resulting in the actor’s death.
In her plea agreement, prosecutors said, Sangha also admitted selling ketamine to an individual in August 2019 who died hours later from a drug overdose.
Known to her customers on the street as the “Ketamine Queen,” according to prosecutors, Sangha had used her North Hollywood home as a “stash house” to store, package and distribute various narcotics dating back to at least June 2019.
(Reporting by Lisa Richwine in Los Angeles; Editing by Edwina Gibbs)
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