from www.bostonglobe.com – A man who has played the role of “Pat Patriot,” the New England Patriots football team’s mascot, has been arrested in a Rhode Island prostitution sting.

Robert Sormanti, 47, of Warwick, R.I., was one of more than a dozen people arrested, the Providence Journal’s website reported Monday.

Rhode Island State Police had no immediate comment.

“The Patriot mascot costume is worn by multiple people. All are held responsible for their actions. The individual in question has been suspended,” Patriots spokesman Stacey James said in a statement. He had no further comment.

Sormanti didn’t immediately return a telephone message seeking comment.

Back story from www.projo.com – SCITUATE, R.I. — The state police say they have arrested six women and eight men under the state’s new prostitution law, which bans indoor solicitation.

The arrests come from several undercover operations in the last two months. In some cases, detectives posed as customers who agreed to meet women in hotels in Providence and Warwick to engage in sex for money.

In at least two other undercover operations, a state police detective posed as a prostitute and attracted eight men to “hotels in the Johnston area.”

During the investigations, the detectives answered or placed advertisements on the adult section of Craigs List or in various newspapers to set up their rendezvous.

“The arrests of these individuals validates the fact that the industry for sex for hire is pervasive here in Rhode Island as a result of the [previous] loophole in the law,” Col. Brendan P. Doherty, superintendent of the state police, said at an afternoon news conference. “This case also demonstrates that the Rhode Island State Police take this seriously. …

“It’s morally wrong, and now it’s illegal,” Doherty said.

Doherty said the tape recordings from the private conversations that took place as part of the investigation were disturbing in nature, reprehensible and a “measure of the lack of respect and dignity shown to someone engaged in this trade.”

Doherty said the hotels and motels used in the investigation had no knowledge of the undercover operations.

Doherty thanked the General Assembly for passing legislation that gave the state police the tools to fight prostitution, and said this wouldn’t be his department’s last initiative.