A Republican congressman from New York state has resigned amid media reports he had flirted online with a woman to whom he sent a shirtless photograph.
Chris Lee, a married 46-year-old with one son, was first elected in 2008.
In a statement on his website, he said he regretted harming his family, staff and constituents, adding: "I deeply and sincerely apologise to them all."
Republicans gained control of the House of Representatives in the November mid-term elections.
"The challenges we face in western New York and across the country are too serious for me to allow this distraction to continue, and so I am announcing that I have resigned my seat in Congress effective immediately," Mr Lee said.
Mr Lee resigned his seat hours after news and gossip website Gawker.com posted e-mail correspondence it said had been sent between the congressman and a 34-year-old single woman he met on the classifieds site Craigslist.
Muscle flexed
The woman, who has not been identified, had posted a note in the "women seeking men" section saying she was looking for an attractive and "financially and emotionally secure" man aged 30 to 40, Gawker reported.
In the e-mails, Mr Lee - who used his real name and e-mail address - described himself inaccurately as a 39-year-old divorced lobbyist, Gawker said.
He said he was a "fit fun classy guy", and sent a photograph of himself posing shirtless in dark slacks in front of a mirror, flexing a bicep.
Mr Lee, who was elected to his second two-year term in November, has been a relatively low-profile, backbench member of the Republican House caucus.
Last year, a congressional ethics panel launched an inquiry after Mr Lee held a fundraising event within 48 hours of a House vote on a financial services regulation reform bill, which he voted against.
The panel dropped the matter in January.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-12413047
