Two doctors have been arrested, as have multiple drug dealers, in connection with the sudden death last year of Matthew Perry at age 54.
The “Friends” star was found dead in his hot tub last October from “acute effects of ketamine,” the source of which federal authorities have been investigating in recent months.
Five people — including the doctors, who were the initial sources of supply — were charged with conspiracy to distribute ketamine, a federal source told ABC News. The source said Perry had found a new source, including the so-called “Ketamine Queen of Los Angeles,” after the doctors’ drugs became too pricey.
The death of an individual identified only as C.M. will also be included in the charges, per the source, citing the indictment.
Perry had recently undergone doctor-supervised ketamine infusion therapy at the time of his death to treat depression and anxiety.
An ABC News journalist tweeted Thursday morning that federal charges had been filed and would be announced at a news briefing later in the day.
News of the arrests was first reported by TMZ, whose law enforcement sources told them multiple law enforcement agencies had executed search warrants and seizures of technology, including computers and phones.
The five-time Emmy nominee was long candid about his struggles with substance abuse but was believed to be sober at the time of his death.
News of the arrests comes nearly three months after TMZ reported that both the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and local authorities were looking into how Perry got access to the ketamine that caused his Oct. 28 death.
Just last month, sources told the outlet that authorities were “confident” they had enough evidence to wrap up the probe, in which multiple arrests were expected.
Sources at the time did not identify any suspects but did confirm a search warrant executed on Charlie Sheen’s ex-wife, “Withchouse” actress Brooke Mueller.
The 46-year-old Palm Beach socialite, who has her own lengthy history of substance abuse-related rehabilitation, was reportedly questioned multiple times in connection with the case.
The Daily News has reached out to Mueller for comment on news of Thursday’s arrests.
The “Friends” actor — known for his role as Chandler Bing on the beloved NBC sitcom — had played pickleball with friends on Oct. 28 hours before his assistant found the actor unresponsive in the hot tub at his Los Angeles-area home and phoned 911.
It was determined in December that ketamine found in Perry’s system could not have been attributed to his last-known session for ketamine infusion therapy, which is believed to have occurred a week and a half before he died. The dissociative anesthetic has a half-life of no more than 4 hours, according to the toxicology report from the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner. The report also noted that it was unknown how Perry took the ketamine that killed him.
In his 2022 memoir, “Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing,” Perry said that while he’d previously enjoyed ketamine recreationally — noting it felt like “being hit in the head with a giant happy shovel” — the infusions made him feel as though he was “dying.”
“Yet I would continually sign up for this s–t because it was something different, and anything different is good,” wrote Perry, who noted the hangover from ketamine “outweighed the shovel.” Ultimately, he determined the drug — which has some hallucinogenic properties — “was not for me.”
Prior to the medical examiner’s toxicology report confirming Perry’s accidental cause of death, friends feared he’d died as the result of an overdose.
Perry isn’t the only celebrity whose substance-related death has resulted in arrests.
Last summer, Robert De Niro’s 19-year-old grandson, Leandro De Niro Rodriguez, fatally overdosed on a mix of fentanyl, cocaine and ketamine. Sofia Haley Marks, now 21, was hit with a federal charge of selling the deadly mix linked to his death.
Three people have been charged in connection with Mac Miller’s fatal overdose in 2018.
In 2022, Stephen Walter was sentenced to more than 17 years behind bars for his role in supplying fentanyl-laced pills that led to the 26-year-old rapper’s death.
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