Queensland's top cop admits promoting a senior officer after he made lewd public comments could make people think the force tolerates sexism and misogyny at its highest levels.
Police Commissioner Katarina Carroll appointed Ray Rohweder as chief superintendent in July, four months after he made the remarks at a conference.
She says she didn't want to promote him, but he'd already been disciplined and she felt obligated to on the recommendation of a promotion panel.
Ms Carroll agrees appointing him could lead people to think the Queensland Police Service tolerated sexism and misogyny at its highest levels.
"Yes, and that's the damaging outcome of that," she told an inquiry on Wednesday.
Deputy Police Commissioner Steve Gollschewski and at least one member of the panel knew about Mr Rohweder's comments when he was recommended for promotion.
Counsel assisting Ruth O'Gorman KC asked Ms Carroll if she thought the promotion would show junior officers such incidents involving their superiors would be "swept under the carpet".
"It wasn't swept under the carpet, it was a bad decision," Ms Carroll said.
"The whole organisation saw it, so it certainly wasn't swept under the carpet.
"If I was a junior officer ... I'd say 'You've got to be joking'. That's why ... I did not want to promote this person."
The commissioner also denied that she avoided taking harsh action against a former deputy after his lewd comments at a conference to avoid negative media coverage.
Former Deputy Commissioner Paul Taylor referred to a gynaecologist friend as a "vagina whisperer" in a speech at a conference in April.
Ms Carroll used a local management resolution (LMR) to deal with Mr Taylor, which resulted in a one-on-one chat with him.
Under the LMR guidelines, she could have asked him to issue an apology, undertake a course or put him under supervision.
However, after the incident was aired in the inquiry in August she encouraged Mr Taylor to resign.
Ms Carroll said local management resolution was intended to be used for one-off instances for which officers are apologetic and address their behaviour.
However, she admits they had been used for serious matters and the LMR system was manual, so there was little oversight.
"LMR has been applied inappropriately (and) have been applied across the state inconsistently," she said.
The inquiry before Judge Deborah Richards continues.
