When news of Rick Koerber's indictment broke last month, Rep. Carl Wimmer downplayed his ties to the Utah County businessman and meetings that Wimmer set up on Koerber's behalf.

But on Thursday, the day before entering a not guilty plea in federal court, Koerber posted a series of photos on his Facebook page of Wimmer speaking in April to Koerber's Free Capitalist conference in Provo.

"I'm not trying to make Carl's life more difficult," Koerber said Friday. "I just happened to chuckle that a few of the pictures seemed to be pretty relevant to the stories of the last couple of weeks."

After Koerber was indicted and accused of running a multimillion-dollar Ponzi scheme, Wimmer said he was a distant acquaintance, not a friend, of Koerber's. He acknowledged he had been on Koerber's radio show a few times and had arranged meetings for him with legislators and Attorney General Mark Shurtleff. Shurtleff's office declined to prosecute a civil case urged by the state Securities Division because officials felt it lacked evidence.

"I need to make it very clear that Mr. Koerber and I are distant acquaintances. We're not friends," the lawmaker told The Tribune at the time .

He didn't mention speaking to Koerber's gathering the prior month.

On Friday, Wimmer acknowledged speaking at Koerber's event. He said he did not endorse Koerber's business program but spoke about the recently concluded legislative session.

"Were we friendly? Absolutely, we were nice to each other and cordial, I didn't have a reason not to be," Wimmer said, but their relationship was strictly professional, between a legislator and a citizen.

Koerber disagrees with Wimmer's characterization.

"I have a different opinion of that," he said. "I consider Carl a friend. I consider Carl a good guy. He kind of hurt my feelings."

Koerber said the night of the April conference at which Wimmer spoke, the two men and their wives had dinner together.

Wimmer said he doesn't think his appearance at the April meeting contradicts his earlier version of events.