Suit: DSU athlete lost scholarship because of church

A former Delaware State University volleyball player says she lost her athletic scholarship because she objected to rules the coach made requiring church attendance and participation in Bible studies.

Natalia Mendieta is suing the university, former coach LaKisya Killingsworth and former athletic director Candy Young in U.S. District Court, alleging they violated the First Amendment by requiring religious activities at a publicly funded university.

DSU Spokesman Carlos Holmes said the university does not comment on ongoing litigation. He said Killingsworth left DSU to "take another post elsewhere."

David Finger, an attorney representing Mendieta, said she wants to return to DSU in the fall but the lack of a scholarship is making it difficult for her to afford it.

The lawsuit alleges that, starting in the fall of 2013, Killingsworth required volleyball players to attend Sunday church services with her at Calvary Assembly of God, part of a network of Pentecostal churches.

Mendieta claims Killingsworth put "church" on the team's official schedule next to practices, matches and tournaments.

"Ms. Mendieta believed that her relationship with Coach Killingsworth would suffer if she refused to attend the coach's church and, if she did, she would receive less playing time and her scholarship might not be renewed for the following year," the lawsuit says. "Therefore, with great reluctance, Ms. Mendieta attended services at Calvary with Coach Killingsworth and the rest of the team during preseason."

In addition to requiring student/athletes to attend church, the lawsuit claims Killingsworth had the team pray before each match, distributed Bibles to the team and "strongly encouraged" players to join the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and attend Bible studies hosted by the group.

On March 24, Mendieta sent Killingsworth a letter voicing concerns about the mandatory church attendance and stopped attending Calvary.

The lawsuit says Killingsworth told her that she didn't care which church she went to. But it says the coach started to avoid speaking with Mendieta and became hostile.

In the spring of 2014, another player's parents complained about the coach's emphasis on religion, and that player ended up quitting the team, the lawsuit says. Though Killingsworth made church and Bible studies optional again, she continued to put church on the team schedule and treated players who attended better than those who didn't, the suit claims.

In the fall of 2014, Killingsworth began looking for excuses to kick Mendieta off the team, the suit says, harshly confronting the player after she and a few other students missed curfew by a few minutes during an away game.

The suit says Killingsworth's actions were an "inappropriate and unconstitutional endorsement of religion by a secular state entity," and say Young, her boss, knew about them. Young left the athletic director job to take a new post in DSU's student affairs division, Holmes said.

It also says the coach violated Mendieta's right to exercise her own religion by forcing her to attend a church to which she did not belong.

It also criticizes DSU for not sufficiently training or supervising its employees to make sure they respected students' constitutional rights.

Contact Matthew Albright at malbright@delawareonline.com, (302) 324-2428 or on Twitter @TNJ_malbright.