The Associated Press

HENDERSON, Ky. - Protesters rallied against the death penalty and sexual discrimination where a state committee was meeting on Wednesday.

Members of the Kentucky Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty and the Kentucky Fairness Alliance rallied before the Interim Judiciary Committee's meeting at the Henderson Fine Arts Center.

The rally drew about 35 people.

Rachel Hurst, western Kentucky organizer for the fairness alliance, complained that state Rep. Gross Lindsay, D-Henderson, has refused to bring a fairness bill up for a hearing or a vote before the House Judiciary Committee.

The bill would prohibit discrimination based on sexual preference or gender identity.

At the end of the meeting, Lindsay offered the public a chance to speak, but only one person did, for fairness legislation.

Lindsay reiterated Wednesday he will not introduce such a bill.

"There is no great interest in the committee to address that," he said. "It's not felt that this is something that there is sufficient interest on the state level."

Death penalty abolitionists made the same complaint - that the General Assembly has not heard their message.

Pat Solomon of Dawson Springs was one of five death penalty opponents who spoke before the committee.

Solomon's sister was murdered in 1969. Her father was a longtime volunteer chaplain at the Kentucky State Penitentiary.

"If one mistaken execution is avoided, it is worth the abolition of the death penalty," she said.