Daily English Article — May 29, 2026

Kenneth Iwamasa, the live-in personal assistant to Friends star Matthew Perry, has been sentenced to 41 months in prison for his role in the actor's death. The 60-year-old, who had no medical training, admitted to repeatedly injecting Perry with ketamine and conspiring with two doctors to supply the drug. Prosecutors stated that more than $50,000 worth of ketamine was provided to Perry in the weeks leading up to his death in October 2023.

Perry was discovered dead in his backyard hot tub in Los Angeles, with his death officially attributed to the acute effects of ketamine, a dissociative anaesthetic, with drowning listed as a contributing factor. Iwamasa pleaded guilty in August 2024 to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine causing death. He faced a maximum penalty of 15 years in federal prison but received a 41-month sentence, along with two years of supervised release and a $10,000 fine.

Iwamasa was the first of five defendants to reach a plea deal in the case and the last to be sentenced, bringing a multi-year legal saga to a close. Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett cited Iwamasa's awareness of Perry's struggle with addiction and his concealment of evidence following the actor's death as key factors in her sentencing decision. He is scheduled to report to prison on 17 July.

In a deeply emotional courtroom scene, Iwamasa took the stand and turned to face Perry's family directly. He expressed profound remorse, saying he was 'horribly, horribly sorry' for the illegal acts he committed and hoped to serve as a cautionary tale for others in similar positions. He offered his condolences to the family and stated that his regret would remain with him for the rest of his life.

Perry's family submitted letters to the court expressing strong views on the sentencing. His mother, Suzanne Morrison, wrote that Iwamasa's most important duty had been to protect her son's sobriety, but instead he aided and abetted illegal drug use. Perry's sister Madeline described Iwamasa as more culpable than the drug dealer in the case. 'We trusted a man without a conscience, and my son paid the price,' Suzanne Morrison wrote.

Researchers have successfully demonstrated a process known as randomness amplification using quantum devices, marking a significant milestone in quantum information science. The experiment, published in Nature, shows that truly random bits — essential for applications such as cryptographic key generation — can be reliably produced and enhanced using quantum technology. This achievement addresses a fundamental challenge: quantum devices are inherently imperfect, meaning the random numbers they generate are flawed and require improvement before practical use.

Randomness amplification works by taking a weakly random input and producing an output of higher-quality, more genuinely unpredictable randomness. The protocol is device-independent, meaning it operates without requiring any assumptions about how the internal components of the quantum devices function. This is a critical feature, as it ensures the method's reliability even when the devices themselves may be untrusted or contain unknown imperfections that could otherwise compromise the integrity of the output.

A central requirement of the experimental protocol is the execution of a loophole-free Bell test within a specific parameter regime. This regime demands both a high Bell violation — a statistical result that confirms genuine quantum behaviour — and a high repetition rate of measurements. Achieving this combination has historically been an experimental challenge. The team overcame this by using superconducting circuits, which are capable of operating at the speeds and precision levels necessary to satisfy both conditions simultaneously.

The theoretical underpinning of this work is particularly striking: it has been formally proven that randomness amplification is impossible to achieve through purely classical means. This means no conventional computer or algorithm, regardless of its sophistication, can replicate what this quantum experiment accomplishes. The demonstration therefore constitutes definitive proof of quantum advantage — the ability of quantum technology to perform a task that is fundamentally beyond the reach of classical information processing.

The findings build on decades of theoretical work, including foundational contributions by Colbeck and Renner, who first proved that free randomness can be amplified using quantum systems. The experimental data and analysis code have been made publicly available through the ETH Zurich Research Collection, supporting reproducibility and further scientific investigation. This breakthrough has broad implications for cybersecurity, quantum computing, and the foundations of physics, potentially transforming how cryptographic systems are designed and validated.