The NSW District Court has been told that a friend of one of the complainants in the Gareth Ward trial into sexual assault allegations tried to retract his police statement.

The trial has now been going for six weeks with Ward facing five charges and has pleaded not guilty to each of them: sexual intercourse without consent, common assault and three counts of indecent assault.

The 44-year-old Independent MP was charged three years ago following complaints against him from a man, aged 24 at the time, over an alleged incident at Potts Point in Sydney’s east a decade ago.

He has also been accused of indecently assaulting a recently turned 18-year-old at the politician’s Meroo Meadow home in 2013.

A friend of the younger complainant was questioned in the Court on Wednesday about an email he sent to the Court before the criminal trial.

In the email, he claimed some of the statement that he had given to police “could’ve been a dream” after detectives had “grilled him” during their investigation before charges were laid against Ward.

The man told Crown Prosecutor Monika Knowles that he was “angry and upset” about being dragged into the investigation and admitted the claims in the email were untrue.

He also told the jury that he was not told anything that “would even come close to being categorised as an assault”.

The complainant had earlier in the trial said Ward encouraged him to drink alcohol at his house in 2013.

He had recently turned 18 and the Crown Prosecutor has told the Court that police allege Ward indecently assaulted the teenager as he lay on the grass and then again inside in his bedroom.

The man, who said he was 17 when he first met Ward, told the jury “I could not move” when he alleged that Ward placed himself on top of him while he was face down in bed and tried to perform a lower back massage.

The trial before Judge Shead continues.

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