Matthew Perry played a pivotal role in Kelly Osbourne’s recovery process during her first rehab stint at 19 years old.
The former reality star’s journey with addiction began when she was just 13 years old following a routine tonsil removal procedure, when she was prescribed medicine which later fueled an opiod dependency.
Osbourne recalled meeting the late “Friends” actor in rehab and admitted she would “never forget” a kind gesture from Perry while she was struggling with her sobriety.
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“He helped so many people. He helped me one day,” Osbourne said on an episode of “TMZ Investigates: Matthew Perry & The Secret Celebrity Drug Ring.”
“I was 19 years old, and I was in rehab for the first time and I just wanted to run – it wasn’t clicking. I didn’t get it. I’d never felt more insecure or hated myself more.”
Osbourne, who has been open about her sobriety, had been in treatment after a yearslong battle with prescription medication.
“He could see that I was struggling, and he walked up to me, and he gave me a chip, and it said ‘three minutes,’” she remembered. “He told me, ‘If you can get through three minutes, you can get through anything.’”
Rehab chips or coins are small tokens often used to celebrate milestones in recovery and serve as a physical reminder of accomplishments with sobriety.
The daughter of rock star Ozzy Osbourne added, “That chip got me through that day, which then got me through the next day, which then got me through the next day, and I’ll never forget that.”
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Osbourne admitted that she had doctors she could call for certain kinds of drugs. “If you want an Adderall doctor, then I knew who to talk to,” she said. “If it was opiates, then I also knew which people in Hollywood.”
She also noted, “At one point, I was going to like six different doctors, and I had them in New York and LA and London, so when I ran out, I could call different ones to refill them for me.”
Dr. Drew Pinsky said addicts are aware of whom to call to get precisely what they need.
“Every drug addict knows a secret ring that they can hook up with, but celebrities more so than anyone,” he said. “It’s not just a drug ring, there’s also a secret physician ring and only a certain doctor you should go to, and this one is the one of the day. And all of it’s bad. It’s all bad.”
Perry died Oct. 28 after an apparent drowning in a hot tub at his home in the Pacific Palisades area of Los Angeles. He was 54.
The “Fools Rush In” actor’s autopsy results, which were released in December, detected trace amounts of ketamine in his stomach. His death was listed due to the “acute effects of ketamine.”
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Other conditions that contributed to his death included “coronary artery disease, buprenorphrine effects,” the report said. “Prescription medications and loose pills” were found at the residence.
“I wish I could say that I was surprised by his death,” Osbourne said. “I was shocked because he’s like the last kind of person you’d ever want to have this kind of life.”
She added, “When you think about how much pain he must have been in, it’s devastating. But at the same time, he was an addict, and you can’t be shocked when an addict passes away, because it’s par for the course.
“It ends in three places – jails, institutions or death.”
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Federal and local law enforcement officials announced in August that multiple arrests had been made in connection to Perry’s overdose death.
U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California Martin Estrada confirmed charges against defendants Jasveen Sangha, 41, a.k.a. “The Ketamine Queen,” of North Hollywood; Dr. Salvador Plasencia, 42, aka “Dr. P,” of Santa Monica; Eric Fleming, 54, of Hawthorne; Kenneth Iwamasa, 59, of Toluca Lake; and Dr. Mark Chavez, 54, of San Diego.
Iwamasa, Perry’s live-in assistant, pleaded guilty on Aug. 7 to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine causing death, and, per Estrada, has already filed a plea agreement.
Sangha and Plasencia are charged with one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine. Sangha is also charged with one count of maintaining a drug-involved premises, one count of possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine, one count of possession with intent to distribute ketamine and five counts of distribution of ketamine.
If convicted of all charges, Sangha would face a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in federal prison and a statutory maximum sentence of life imprisonment. Plasencia would face up to 10 years in federal prison for each ketamine-related count and up to 20 years in federal prison for each record falsification count.
