South Yorkshire Police Commissioner Shaun Wright has resigned after coming under mounting pressure over the Rotherham child abuse scandal.
Mr Wright had resisted calls to step down from the Prime Minister and Home Secretary after a report found 1,400 children in the South Yorkshire town had been victims of child sexual exploitation since 1997.
He also endured a grilling from MPs and was confronted by relatives of abuse victims at an angry public meeting in Rotherham earlier this month, when he again refused to quit.
Mr Wright was councillor with responsibility for children's services in the borough from 2005 to 2010, when Professor Alexis Jay's report found officials failed to act to stop gangs of abusers.
Sarah Wilson confronted Mr Wright last week over her abused sister's death In a statement released by his office, he said: "My role as South Yorkshire police and crime commissioner has clearly become prominent in terms of public opinion and media coverage following the publication of Professor Alexis Jay's report.
"This is detracting from the important issue, which should be everybody's focus - the 1,400 victims outlined in the report - and in providing support to victims and bringing to justice the criminals responsible for the atrocious crimes committed against them.
"With this in mind, I feel that it is now right to step down from the position of police and crime commissioner for South Yorkshire, for the sake of those victims, for the sake of the public of South Yorkshire and to ensure that the important issues outlined in the report about tackling child sexual exploitation can be discussed and considered in full and without distraction."
Joyce Thacker has resisted calls to resign from her children's services job Mr Wright is the first of 41 elected police and crime commissioners to resign and his departure will trigger a by-election in South Yorkshire to find a replacement.
Keith Vaz, chair of parliament's Home Affairs Select Committee, said: "This is something that we asked Shaun Wright to do 10 days ago when he appeared before the committee.
"At that stage, he said he needed to stay on because of the victims. Today, he says he has to resign because of the victims.
"I welcome this, I think this is the right thing to do. To let it go on any longer would put him in direct conflict with some of the issues we were discussing in parliament.
"The committee is actively drafting a bill based on ensuring police and crime commissioners can't stay on when they've lost the confidence of local people."
Roger Stone, leader of Rotherham Council, announced he was stepping down when the damning abuse report was published in August and the council's chief executive Martin Kimber said last week that he would leave his post in December.
The current head of children's services in Rotherham, Joyce Thacker, has refused to quit despite being told by Mr Vaz that she should resign "as a matter of conscience".
Rotherham Council also faces an independent inspection that will look at whether years of abuse in the town were covered up.
The probe will be led by Louise Casey, head of the Government's troubled families programme and a former victims' commissioner.
Bassetlaw MP John Mann called for former Labour home secretary David Blunkett, who is leaving the Commons next year, to put himself forward to replace Mr Wright.
He said: "He is a credible and dedicated public servant who has served in a variety of roles locally and nationally. He knows and understands South Yorkshire and is widely respected throughout the area.
"I believe he will get to the bottom of what went wrong in South Yorkshire."
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