Matthew Perry ketamine supplier Erik Fleming gets two years in prison

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BBC US actor Matthew Perry laughs on set while wearing a black shirt and khaki blazer. bbc.com

Matthew Perry on 17 February 2015. Photograph: Brian Ach/Invision/AP theguardian.com

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A federal judge in Los Angeles has sentenced Erik Fleming, a drug addiction counsellor, to two years in prison for his role in the ketamine overdose death of actor Matthew Perry, according to the BBC. Fleming pleaded guilty in 2024 to a ketamine distribution conspiracy charge and is one of five defendants in the case, all of whom have pleaded guilty. Perry was found dead in a backyard jacuzzi in southern California in 2023, with the medical examiner attributing the death to the acute effects of ketamine.

Court filings and sentencing arguments sketched an unusually direct chain from a celebrity’s money and access to a small, informal supply network that treated addiction as a sales opportunity. The Guardian, citing the Associated Press, reports that Fleming sourced ketamine from Jasveen Sangha, whom prosecutors dubbed the “Ketamine Queen,” and supplied it onward to Perry and to Perry’s live-in assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa. Prosecutors argued that Fleming’s position as a counsellor mattered: he was not simply another intermediary, but someone who traded on proximity to treatment settings while supplying illegal drugs to a person known to be struggling. Fleming’s lawyers asked for a far shorter term that included time in a residential treatment facility, while prosecutors pushed for the court to weigh the professional role alongside the conduct.

The case has also become a rare example of a celebrity overdose producing multiple convictions up and down the chain, including medical professionals. The BBC says two doctors were among those charged with supplying ketamine to Perry and exploiting his addiction for profit. In separate sentencings, the Guardian reports that Sangha received a lengthy prison term, while one doctor was sentenced to prison and another received home detention and supervised release. The remaining defendant to be sentenced is Iwamasa, who pleaded guilty and is scheduled for sentencing later this month.

Perry’s death began as a private medical finding in a backyard. It is ending as a public ledger of who took money, who wrote prescriptions, and who delivered the vials.