The China Mail - Doctor who supplied drugs to 'Friends' star Matthew Perry pleads guilty

Salvador Plasencia, 43, one of five people charged over Perry's death, pleaded guilty in a federal court in Los Angeles to four counts of distribution of ketamine.

Plasencia is to be sentenced on December 3 and faces up to 40 years in prison.

"Dr. Plasencia is profoundly remorseful for the treatment decisions he made while providing ketamine to Matthew Perry," Rolling Stone magazine quoted Plasencia's lawyer, Karen Goldstein, as saying in a statement.

"He is fully accepting responsibility by pleading guilty to drug distribution," Goldstein said.

Plasencia did not provide Perry with the fatal dose of ketamine but supplied the actor with the drug in the weeks before he was found dead in a hot tub at his Los Angeles home.

Another doctor, Mark Chavez, pleaded guilty in October to conspiring to distribute ketamine to Perry.

Plasencia allegedly bought ketamine off Chavez and sold it to the American-Canadian actor at hugely inflated prices.

"I wonder how much this moron will pay," Plasencia wrote in one text message presented by prosecutors.

Jasveen Sangha, the alleged "Ketamine Queen" who supplied drugs to high-end clients and celebrities, is charged with selling Perry the dose that killed him. She has pleaded not guilty.

Perry's live-in personal assistant and another man pleaded guilty in August to charges of conspiracy to distribute ketamine.

O.Tse--ThChM