Did speaker warn Chris Lee about partying?

BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) - Just hours after the damning story broke, the second-term Republican gave up his seat.

News 4 is still trying to find out where Congressman Lee went after leaving Washington Wednesday evening, it doesn't appear that he's returned home.

The scandal revolves around a report on Gawker.com that featured a picture, allegedly sent by Lee, who's married, to a single woman on Craigslist's dating page.

   >> Theloop21.com has an interview with who they claim is the woman who received the picture

It's a photo that Gawker.com says was taken January 14th, the same day a 34-year-old woman first posted a message in the "women seeking men" column of Craigslist.

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Lee is 46 and married, but apparently answered the ad saying he was a 39 year old, divorced lobbyist, and at first, sent a picture.

The woman responded saying, "Are you sure that's not a photo from a JC Penney's ad?"

He responded "lol...no...here I just took one. I'm relaxing at home."

She responds, "Thanks, do you always send shirtless pictures to women from Craigslist." He responds, "Sorry, it's all I had."

Gawker.com's chief editor tells News 4's George Richert his staff researched the story for four days before running it. They used geolocating to confirm the picture was taken in Washington DC, and traced the messages to the same Gmail account that Congressman Lee used for a personal Facebook page.

They called Lee's office about it Tuesday morning, more than 24 hours before the story ran.

Gawker.com Editor in Chief Remy Sterns said, "You know we didn't necessarily want him to resign, we wanted to just know what the story was. Did he really do this? What was he thinking, and you know how does a member of Congress do this sort of thing, send photos that show his face using his own gmail address and not expect that this is gonna get out."

Another Internet news source called Politico.com is reporting now that House Speaker John Boehner had warned several junior lawmakers last year to knock off the partying with female lobbyists, and that Lee was one of those lawmakers warned. On Thursday, Boehner spoke out about Lee's resignation, saying he made the right decision.