Matthew Perry’s mother painted a heartbreaking picture of the day she saw her son’s dead body in the morgue as she assailed his former assistant ahead of his sentencing hearing.
In a filing from prosecutors featuring multiple letters to the court obtained by the Daily Mail, Suzanne Morrison described her frantic struggle to cover the late Friends star’s body after he was found unresponsive in a hot tub at his Los Angeles home on October 28, 2023, as well as his ‘almost beautiful’ appearance when she was able to see his body in the morgue a day later.
Morrison recounted her sorrows as she assailed her son’s former assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, who admitted to injecting Perry with multiple doses of ketamine shortly before his death.
Iwamasa, 60, was the first of the five people implicated in the actor’s death to reach a plea deal with prosecutors. In exchange for pleading guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine causing death, Perry’s former assistant agreed to be a key witness against others charged in relation to Perry’s death.
Iwamasa will be the last of the five people charged in Perry’s death to be sentenced, with his hearing scheduled for May 27.
In her letter to the court, Morrison opens by establishing the close bond that she and her late son shared.
Matthew Perry’s mother, Suzanne Morrison (L), painted a heartbreaking picture of the day she saw her son’s dead body in the morgue as she assailed his former assistant ahead of his sentencing hearing; pictured with husband Keith Morrison (R)
Morrison recounted her sorrows as she assailed her son’s former assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, in a letter to the court ahead of his sentencing. Iwamasa admitted to injecting Perry with multiple doses of ketamine shortly before his death; Perry is pictured in 2012 in LA
‘My name is Suzanne. I am also Momma-Mooma, the name my son Matthew gave me. The name I loved to hear for all those years,’ she begins her letter. ‘He was my Matso, my Manew. He was, in spite of all we went through, my heart and my soul.’
‘And then one night he was just a body, lying all but naked on the cold damp grass of his backyard,’ she continues in a stark reversal.
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Morrison recalls how ‘Helicopters circled overhead, eager for a glimpse of my dead little boy, a picture they could show the whole world while I stood out on the street in the cold and begged for a blanket to cover him.’
‘Impossible, of course,’ she adds.
The following day, Morrison was able to ‘see him in a mortuary,’ where Perry had ‘been bathed and dressed.’
She writes that her son ‘looked almost beautiful and somehow relieved, like a gladiator who has finally earned his rest.’
Morrison’s letter also delves into Perry’s decades-long battle with substance abuse.
‘Matthew fought for half his life – more than half – against addiction. Fought and failed and came back to fight again,’ she continues.
How should those closest to celebrities be held accountable when trust is betrayed in such tragic ways?
Morrison recalls how ‘Helicopters circled overhead, eager for a glimpse of my dead little boy’ as she begged for a blanket to cover him, only to see him in the mortuary the following day, when he ‘looked almost beautiful and somehow relieved’; Perry is seen with sister Emily and mom Suzanne
Morrison writes that Iwamasa (pictured) tried to comfort her family and even spoke at Perry’s funeral, despite having injected him with multiple doses of ketamine before his death
Once the subject turns to Iwamasa, whom she calls ‘Kenny,’ Morrison calls out his alleged ‘treachery.’
She says that it was such a ‘relief’ when Perry hired Iwamasa, because they all ‘believed’ that he truly ‘understood’ Perry’s struggles over the 25 years they worked together.
‘Matthew trusted Kenny. We trusted Kenny,’ Morrison continues, writing that ‘Kenny’s most important job’ was to be Perry’s ‘companion and guardian in his fight against addiction.
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According to her, Iwamasa’s primary responsibility was to ‘ensure that Matthew remained what he wanted to be: drug free.’
‘Kenny knew, should he feel unduly pressured, that with one phone call to any number of the people in Matthew’s orbit, reinforcements would be on the way, and his job would be safe,’ she adds.
‘But instead of protecting Matthew, he aided and abetted illegal drug taking, arranged for one source of supply, then another,’ Morrison writes in a fury. ‘Shot the drugs into Matthew’s body though he was not in the least qualified.
‘He did it even though he could see, anyone could have seen, it was so obviously dangerous,’ she continues. ‘And he did it again and again.’
Morrison was particularly incensed at how Iwamasa tried to be a support to her after Perry’s death, despite having administered multiple doses of ketamine to him on his last day.
‘Instead of protecting Matthew, he aided and abetted illegal drug taking, arranged for one source of supply, then another,’ Morrison writes in a fury. ‘Shot the drugs into Matthew’s body though he was not in the least qualified’; Suzanne and Keith Morrison pictured in April
Morrison mused on closure at the end of her letter. ‘Such a thing doesn’t exist. Ask any mother whose child has been torn away so mercilessly. Nothing takes this pain away, nor will it, I am sure, for as long as I live,’ she writes; Perry is pictured in 2022
‘And when he had killed my son, he kept a sharp eye on me. He sent me songs, he drew a little map to help me find my way around the cemetery,’ Morrison writes. ‘If he saw a rainbow – one of Matthew’s favorite things – he would call me.’
She says that Iwamasa even ‘insisted on speaking at Matthew’s funeral’ and ‘clung to me and the family as if he was somehow the good guy who tried to save Matthew.’
Morrison claims that, ‘all along, he seemed to be watching me, checking…did I know something?’
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She goes on to accuse Perry’s assistant of threatening ‘legal action to pry a settlement from workmen’s comp’ after it ‘became obvious there would be no financial payout for him.’
Ultimately, she writes, ‘We trusted a man without a conscience, and my son paid the price.’
After praising the detectives who investigated the circumstances behind Perry’s death and the judge, Morrison muses on whether ‘closure’ is even possible for her.
‘I have to say this: the word “closure.” Such a thing doesn’t exist,’ she concludes. ‘Ask any mother whose child has been torn away so mercilessly. Nothing takes this pain away, nor will it, I am sure, for as long as I live.’
Also included in the latest filing from prosecutors was a letter written by Perry’s half-sister Madeline Morrison, whom Suzanne shares with her husband, Dateline correspondent Keith Morrison.
Another letter obtained by the Daily Mail was from Perry’s half-sister Madeline (pictured together). ‘The idea that someone my brother considered family could betray him in such an unimaginable way is something I never could have conceived,’ she writes
She begins her letter by admitting that it’s ‘difficult to put into words the sense of betrayal I felt when I found out what Kenny had done.’
‘The idea that someone my brother considered family could betray him in such an unimaginable way is something I never could have conceived,’ she writes.
Madeline says that learning of Iwamasa’s alleged deceptions made it feel as if her brother had ‘died all over again.’
‘Everything I believed about the day he died – everything Kenny told us – was a lie,’ Madeline claims. ‘I had to relive Matthew’s death from an entirely new and devastating perspective.’
She writes that, in hindsight, ‘certain moments now feel painfully clear’ as she describes ‘how manic and unsettled Kenny seemed’ as she and her sister chose clothes for him to be buried in.
Madeline also claims that Iwamasa ‘repeatedly volunteered his version of events without being asked, as if he were being interviewed rather than mourning a friend.’
‘At the time, I told myself he was simply in shock, grieving as we all were,’ she writes. ‘In reality, he was trying to distract us from the truth: that he had injected my brother with a lethal dose of ketamine and left him in a hot tub to die.’
She also addresses Iwamasa’s speech at Perry’s funeral, calling it a ‘cruel joke.’
‘Everything I believed about the day he died – everything Kenny told us – was a lie,’ Madeline claims. ‘I had to relive Matthew’s death from an entirely new and devastating perspective.’
Iwamsa, the first of the five people charged relating to Perry’s death, was the first to cooperate and take a plea. He’ll be sentenced on May 27, after drug counselor Erik Fleming (pictured on May 13) was sentenced to three years of probation
‘He didn’t just take my brother’s life – he tainted our final memories of saying goodbye,’ Madeline says.
She goes on to recall a moment during the trial of Jasveen Sangha, who was sentenced to 15 years in prison, the harshest of the sentences so far, after she pleaded guilty to three counts of distribution of ketamine, one count of distribution of ketamine resulting in death or serious bodily injury and one count of using her home for drug distribution, according to the Associated Press.
‘Your honor, you asked counsel a question at the sentencing of Jasveen Sangha about who was more culpable…the drug dealer responsible for supplying the drugs that killed my brother, or the so-called loyal assistant who bought the drugs by any means necessary, injected him with a lethal dose and left him to die,’ Madeline recalls. ‘I think it’s safe to guess what my answer would be.’
Iwamasa’s upcoming sentencing hearing follows sentencing for the licensed drug counselor Erik Fleming, who pleaded guilty to one count of distribution of ketamine resulting in death and was sentenced to two years in prison, followed by three years of probation.
Dr. Salvador Plasencia also pleaded guilty to four counts of distribution of ketamine for supplying Perry with Ketamine beyond the amount that the actor’s regular doctor was willing to prescribe.
He was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison, along with two years of probation and a $5,600 fine.
Dr. Mark Chavez, who provided the ketamine doses to Plasencia, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine, and he has already surrendered his medical license.
He was sentenced to eight months of home confinement and three years of supervised release.
