Boulder, USA - A 12-member Boulder jury couldn't agree in the case of a 49-year-old Niwot man who admitted drinking the urine of an 8-year-old girl that he slept nude with.
Joseph S. Cardillo testified in his defense earlier that he had been give "urine therapy" training while living in India and that walking around nude and drinking urine are accepted practices in "alternative communities."
The case involved the daughter of a fellow nudist who let her daughter spend weekends with Cardillo. The two met at a Hare Krishna meeting in Boulder.
Authorities were contacted in October 2007 after the girl's teachers became concerned. They told police the girl came to school hungry and wearing dirty clothes. They said she cried often and couldn't focus on schoolwork.
According to police reports, the girl told investigators she and Cardillo often spent time together in the nude, including bathing and sleeping together, that Cardillo used a sex toy on her and that he drank her urine from his cupped hands.
In his defense, Cardillo said the girl wanted him to drink her urine.
"It was a ritual and I honor her for it, but I don't know why I did it," Cardillo testified. "It's not accepted practice in this country -- it might have been different in India."
Cardillo was charged with sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust and failure to appear in court after he fled the state earlier this year. He was arrested in Sedona, Ariz.
A new trial has been set for the week of Jan. 26.