A Southern California woman known to her customers as the Ketamine Queen pleaded guilty Wednesday to five counts in the overdose death of “Friends” star Matthew Perry.
Jasveen Sangha, 42, pleaded guilty to one count of maintaining a drug-involved premises, three counts of distribution of ketamine, and one count of distribution of ketamine resulting in death or serious bodily injury, according to a spokesman for the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.
Sangha, of North Hollywood, changed her previous not guilty plea at a federal court in Los Angeles. She is the fifth and final defendant charged in the overdose death of the “Friends” star to plead guilty after a deal with prosecutors.
She agreed in a signed statement to plead to five federal charges, including providing the ketamine that led to Perry’s death. Her trial had been planned to start later this month.
Sangha is set to be sentenced on Dec. 10. She faces a maximum prison sentence of 65 years, prosecutors said last month.
Sangha’s attorney, Mark Geragos, told the judge that the sentencing hearing in December would likely be unusually long because of evidentiary issues he wanted to explore. Geragos said he also planned to call witnesses to the stand.
Geragos told reporters that Sangha never met Perry and suggested that “some quirks in the law” unfairly allowed her to be charged in connection with the actor’s death. The attorney said he wanted to determine “who was responsible for what” during the sentencing hearing.
In a brief statement when the deal was announced on Aug. 18, Geragos said, “She’s taking responsibility for her actions.”
Prosecutors had cast Sangha, a citizen of the U.S. and the U.K., as a prolific drug dealer who was known to her customers as the “Ketamine Queen,” using the term often in press releases and court documents.
Prosecutors agreed to drop three other counts related to the distribution of ketamine, and one count of distribution of methamphetamine that was unrelated to the Perry case.
The final plea deal came a year after federal prosecutors announced that five people had been charged in Perry’s Oct. 28, 2023 death after a sweeping investigation.
The judge is not bound to follow any terms of the plea agreement, but prosecutors said in the document that they will ask for less than the maximum. None of the co-defendants have been sentenced yet.
Sangha and Dr. Salvador Plasencia, who pleaded guilty in July, had been the primary targets of the investigation. Three other defendants — Dr. Mark Chavez, Kenneth Iwamasa and Erik Fleming — pleaded guilty in exchange for their cooperation, which included statements implicating Sangha and Plasencia.
Perry was found dead in his Los Angeles home by Iwamasa, his assistant. The medical examiner ruled that ketamine, typically used as a surgical anesthetic, was the primary cause of death.
Sangha presented a posh lifestyle on Instagram, with photos of herself with the rich and famous in cities around the globe. Prosecutors said she privately presented herself as a dealer who sold to the same kind of high-class customers.
Perry had been using ketamine through his regular doctor as a legal, but off-label, treatment for depression, which has become increasingly common. Perry, 54, sought more ketamine than his doctor would give him, and his search for more led him to Sangha through his friend Fleming about two weeks before his death, prosecutors said.
Fleming messaged Perry’s assistant saying her ketamine was “amazing” and that she deals only “with high end and celebs.”
Perry bought large amounts of ketamine from Sangha, including 25 vials for $6,000 in cash four days before his death, prosecutors said.
On the day of Perry’s death, Sangha told Fleming they should delete all the messages they had sent each other, according to her indictment.
Sangha has been in federal custody for about a year.
Perry struggled with addiction for many years, dating back to his time on “Friends,” when he became one of the biggest stars of his generation as Chandler Bing. He starred alongside Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc and David Schwimmer for 10 seasons from 1994 to 2004 on NBC’s megahit series.
