The prosecutor called him "a thug."

It was a second similar conviction for Todd Cook — assaulting someone he didn't know — the prosecutor told the Lancaster County judge on Friday.

This time, the victim was a pregnant woman attacked by Cook and his girlfriend, Iris Ortiz, outside a local beauty school.

And such behavior, Assistant District Attorney Mark Fetterman said, "cannot be tolerated."

Judge Dennis Reinaker agreed, sentencing Cook to 11 to 46 months in prison, plus three years probation, for charges of simple assault, recklessly endangering another person, conspiracy and harassment.

Earlier this month, a jury convicted the couple of assaulting the pregnant woman on Sept. 2, 2009, in the parking lot outside the Empire Beauty School, 1801 Columbia Ave.

"He is a thug, nothing more," Fetterman said of Cook.

Both Cook and Ortiz testified during the trial, openly admitting they punched, hit and kicked the victim, Tahyna Jimenez.

Ortiz, 22, of Howard Avenue, said she did it because she was paid by another person.

Cook, 22, of South Ann Street, said he did it to help Ortiz, the mother of his child.

Jimenez also testified how she told her attackers that she was pregnant, crying out, "My baby, my baby," and holding her belly as she was thrown to the ground and was repeatedly punched and kicked in the head and stomach.

Witnesses tried to stop the fight and called the police as the assailants fled.

Jimenez was hospitalized for a time, but testified that her baby was born unharmed.

Fetterman noted that Cook had a prior conviction — for simple assault and terroristic threats.

In that case, Fetterman said, Cook randomly attacked a man who was in the process of getting his toddler out of a car seat.

"To attack people he doesn't know cannot be tolerated," Fetterman said. "He is a menace to the community."

"I'm not a thug," Cook told the judge. "I really made a mistake. I'm sorry … I know I was wrong."

Cook, who was given probation for the first assault conviction, said he had a job at a fast food restaurant but was put in jail twice for violating his probation.

He was out of prison nine days when he was arrested for beating the pregnant woman, Cook told the judge.

Defense attorney Christopher Lyden said Cook "does appear to be remorseful for what he did" and seems to be "amenable to rehabilitation."

"I honestly don't know what to make of you," Reinaker told Cook. "I think you honestly don't get it."

Reinaker cited two reasons for imposing a sentence longer than the standard guidelines established by the state Legislature.

The first, Reinaker said, was that Cook has a history of physically attacking someone he doesn't know.

"To get involved in a fight with another woman, kicking this woman while she's on the ground," Reinaker said, "defies any rational explanation."

And that, added to the fact that Cook has a prior conviction "for something equally irrational," Reinaker said, "it's not acceptable behavior."

Secondly, Reinaker said, "the viciousness" of the crime justified a longer prison term.

"To hit a woman, kick her and punch her while she was on the ground," Reinaker said, "and there's no doubt in my mind you heard her say she was pregnant."

Cook was made eligible for the work release program, but Reinaker made it clear the money was to be used for child support, restitution of more than $900 and $200 in fines.

In addition, Reinaker ordered Cook to successfully complete anger management classes.

Cook, the judge noted, was found guilty by the jury of a less serious set of charges than Ortiz.

"You are a very lucky man the way this turned out," the judge told Cook.

jkelley@lnpnews.com