Kiama MP Gareth Ward's criminal trial enters week five

Illawarra Mercury

What do you need to know about the first four weeks of Gareth Ward's criminal trial as we enter week five, court reporter Grace Crivellaro breaks it down for us. Footage by Maddy Fogarty

Transcript

00:00I'm Grace Crivolero and I'm a court reporter at the Illawarra Mercury.

00:04I've been covering Kiama MP Gareth Ward's criminal trial for the past four weeks.

00:08It's now entered its fifth week, so we thought we'd give you a bit of an overview of what's

00:12gone on so far. So Gareth Ward has been a politician in the area for quite a long time now.

00:18He was first elected into Shoalhaven City Council in 2004. He was elected as Kiama MP

00:24in 2011 and he retained that seat in 2023 in the latest state election. Gareth Ward is on trial

00:33for five charges which he has pleaded not guilty to. The first day of his trial was on May 26 in

00:41Sydney's Downing Centre District Court. These are historic sexual abuse charges and some assault

00:47charges. So Mr Ward has pleaded not guilty to sexual intercourse without consent and that's

00:53alleged to have been committed against a man who was 24 at the time in 2015 and that incident is

00:59alleged to have happened after an event at Parliament House. Mr Ward has also pleaded not

01:04guilty to three counts of indecent assault and one alternative count of common assault against a

01:10man who was 18 at the time at Gareth Ward's Maroo Meadow home in 2013. So he has pleaded not guilty to

01:18all of those allegations. On the first day of the trial, the prosecutors opened with those

01:22allegations and Mr Ward's defence team did not make an opening address and all that means is we'll

01:28just hear from his team at the end of the trial. So Mr Ward is facing trial in Sydney instead of a local

01:34court down here and basically it was scheduled for four weeks but we've entered the fifth week. We don't

01:41really know how long it's going to go for. There's only really been one main interruption which was last week

01:48on Wednesday or Thursday when a water main at the Downing Centre burst. A bit of chaos there, all

01:55lawyers, court reporters and other punters were evacuated from the building and it's one of the

02:00largest courts in Sydney and services a lot of matters. So those matters will all be delayed for

02:08four weeks while those repairs get underway but Mr Ward's trial was moved to Darlinghurst so it will continue

02:15there. So I've covered this trial most days now. You can head to illawarramercury.com.au to read more

02:21details about what's happened so far.

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