MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum on Wednesday denied a CNN report that the CIA was carrying out deadly operations in Mexican territory, accusing the U.S.-based news organization of attempting to “hurt the government and the people of Mexico.”
CNN reported Tuesday that the CIA facilitated a targeted assassination of a member of the Sinaloa cartel on a highway outside Mexico City, fueling a firestorm in Mexico. The New York Times later reported that Mexican forces carried out the attack and the CIA provided planning and support.
Sheinbaum called the CNN report a “lie.” Asked about the New York Times report during her morning press briefing, she called it “a fiction the size of the universe.”
Liz Lyons, a spokesperson for the CIA, also lambasted the CNN report, posting on X that “this is false and salacious reporting that serves as nothing more than a PR campaign for the cartels and puts American lives at risk.”
A CNN spokesperson said the CIA had been presented with details of the report prior to publication and had declined to comment. While the network did not directly address Sheinbaum's statements, it said it stands by its reporting.
“After publication, CIA spokesperson Liz Lyons released a statement to CNN saying, ‘This is false and salacious reporting that serves as nothing more than a PR campaign for the cartels and puts American lives at risk,’ without specifying what aspect of the reporting is false,” the CNN spokesperson said.
The New York Times did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
While Sheinbaum's mentor and predecessor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, regularly attacked journalists in his morning news briefings, going as far as to dox critical reporters, Sheinbaum has taken a more measured tone in the face of criticism.
But the president has been plagued by scandals involving the United States in recent weeks as she comes under pressure to maintain a strong relationship with Washington in the face of renegotiating a free-trade agreement and threats by U.S. President Donald Trump to take action on cartels.
Sheinbaum has underscored Mexico's sovereignty, a narrative that increasingly has been questioned.
Last month, two CIA agents were killed in a car crash along with local Mexican investigators on their return from an anti-narcotics operation in the northern state of Chihuahua. Sheinbaum said she had no knowledge of the operation, and Mexican and U.S. authorities contradicted themselves for days.
A week later, a New York court charged Sinaloa's governor — a high-ranking member of Sheinbaum's party and ally of López Obrador — with drug trafficking and weapons offenses, accused of aiding in the massive importation of illicit narcotics into the U.S.
Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum arrives at the National Palace to give her daily morning press conference in Mexico City, Thursday, April 30, 2026. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A licensed drug addiction counselor who delivered “Friends” star Matthew Perry the doses of ketamine that killed him was sentenced Wednesday to two years in prison.
Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett handed down the sentence to 56-year-old Erik Fleming in a federal court in Los Angeles.
“It’s truly a nightmare I can’t wake up from,” Fleming told the judge before the sentence. “I’m haunted by the mistakes I made.” He wore a black suit and spoke at the podium with a deep, somber voice.
A judge ordered Fleming, who has been free on bond for about two years, to turn himself in to serve his term in 45 days. He was also sentenced to three years of probation.
Fleming was the fourth defendant sentenced of the five who have pleaded guilty in prosecutions over the actor’s 2023 death in the Jacuzzi at his Los Angeles home. Fleming connected Perry to Jasveen Sangha, the convicted drug who dealer prosecutors called “The Ketamine Queen.” She was sentenced last month to 15 years in prison.
Fleming gave up Sangha to investigators the same day they found him at his sister's house, where he was sleeping on the couch several months after Perry's death. He became the first defendant to plead guilty in August 2024, admitting to one count of distribution of ketamine resulting in death. That was before arrests in the case were even announced, and Wednesday was his first court appearance since his role became public knowledge.
His attorney Robert Dugdale told the judge he “handed over the Ketamine Queen on a silver platter.”
“They didn't have a clue who she was before that day," Dugdale said.
He would have gotten about four years in prison if it weren’t for his cooperation, according to federal sentencing guidelines.
The prosecution said he deserved credit for doing the right thing, but argued that he did so only when confronted and cornered by authorities.
“Mr. Fleming didn’t cooperate because he had a benevolent motive, or because he wanted justice for Mr. Perry,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Ian Yanniello said. “He wanted to save himself.”
The judge also pointed out that Fleming didn't come forward in the months after Perry's death, that he didn't create new evidence by making phone calls to co-conspirators or anything similar, and that the information he provided might have been obtained anyway simply through the seizure of his phone.
But all agreed that he sped up and smoothed the investigation with his cooperation.
Prosecutors said in a sentencing memo that his role as a drug counselor who “deliberately undertook to sell illegal street drugs to a victim who had a public, well-documented battle with drug addiction” should count against him, even if Perry wasn’t one of his regular clients.
Defense lawyers emphasized that he had no criminal record and repeatedly pointed out that he only spent 11 days of his life dealing drugs and to a single customer.
They had asked for a sentence of three months in prison and nine months in a residential drug treatment facility.
Fleming said his great remorse “can’t compare to the agony I’ve caused” to Perry’s family and friends.
He and his lawyers also highlighted what they called his extraordinary work towards rehabilitation, spending 20 months sober and helping to establish a sober living home. After the hearing, he hugged several friends who were in the courtroom to support him.
Perry had been receiving ketamine treatments for depression — an increasingly common off-label use.
A few weeks before his death, Perry was seeking more of the drug than he could get through doctors and asked a friend to help him get more. She was in a treatment facility, so introduced Perry to Fleming. He was a former film and television producer whose career had been ravaged by addiction. He got sober and became a drug counselor, but had relapsed after the 2023 death of a beloved stepmother who had rescued him from a traumatic childhood, his lawyers said.
Fleming would get ketamine from Sangha, mark up the price to make a profit, and deliver it to Perry’s house, where he sold it to the actor’s live-in personal assistant Kenneth Iwamasa.
His deliveries included 25 vials for $6,000 four days before Perry’s death.
Iwamasa would inject Perry from that batch on Oct. 28, 2023, and hours later, he found the actor dead. A medical examiner’s report found that Perry died from the acute effects of ketamine, a surgical anesthetic, and drowning was a secondary cause.
Iwamasa is set to be the last defendant sentenced in two weeks.
Perry, who died at 54, became one of the biggest stars of his generation as Chandler Bing on “Friends,” NBC’s culture-changing sitcom that ran from 1994 to 2004.
An auction of his valuables including “Friends” memorabilia will go to benefit the foundation founded in his name after his death.
Erik Fleming departs federal court in Los Angeles after being sentenced in connection with the ketamine overdose death of actor Matthew Perry, on Wednesday, May 13, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Caroline Brehman)
Erik Fleming, second from left, departs federal court with defense lawyers Robert Dugdale, left, and Jeffrey Chemerinsky, second from right, after being sentenced in connection with the ketamine overdose death of actor Matthew Perry, on Wednesday, May 13, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Caroline Brehman)
Erik Fleming departs federal court in Los Angeles after being sentenced in connection with the ketamine overdose death of actor Matthew Perry, on Wednesday, May 13, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Caroline Brehman)
Erik Fleming departs federal court in Los Angeles after being sentenced in connection with the ketamine overdose death of actor Matthew Perry, on Wednesday, May 13, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Caroline Brehman)
Erik Fleming arrives at federal court in Los Angeles for sentencing in connection with the ketamine overdose death of actor Matthew Perry, on Wednesday, May 13, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Caroline Brehman)
Erik Fleming, left, arrives with defense lawyers Robert Dugdale, center, and Jeffrey Chemerinsky, right, at federal court in Los Angeles for sentencing in connection with the ketamine overdose death of actor Matthew Perry, on Wednesday, May 13, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Caroline Brehman)
Erik Fleming arrives at federal court in Los Angeles for sentencing in connection with the ketamine overdose death of actor Matthew Perry, on Wednesday, May 13, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Caroline Brehman)
FILE - Matthew Perry poses for a portrait in New York on Feb. 17, 2015. (Photo by Brian Ach/Invision/AP, File)
