Racial abuse before fatal Vic servo brawl

An Iraqi migrant who fatally stabbed a man outside a Victorian service station says he was only trying to scare off his attacker.

A plea hearing for Raad Kamil Ajil, 29, of Cobram, was told he had been racially abused moments before two carloads of young men clashed and Hayden Atkinson-Thring, 20, was fatally stabbed.

Defence lawyer Ian Crisp read from police statements given by the victim's friends, which said Mr Atkinson-Thring was affected by drugs and alcohol at the time, and had been acting aggressively.

The court was told Mr Atkinson-Thring shouted: "Come out here you Arab c***" at Ajil, who was parked at Cobram service station.

After a verbal confrontation, Ajil attempted to drive off but stopped and got out when something hit his car.

During the brawl that followed, Mr Atkinson-Thring ran towards Ajil with his fists clenched and Ajil first backed away before stabbing him once in the chest.

"I was trying to scare him, keep him away ... I didn't want this to happen," Ajil said in his police interview, which was also read out in the Victorian Supreme Court on Tuesday.

Ajil, who had migrated to Australia in 1997 after time in a refugee camp, has pleaded guilty to manslaughter over the January 2014 stabbing.

The victim's family tearfully read from victim impact statements describing Mr Atkinson-Thring as an outgoing young man with a kind heart.

Justice Christopher Beale adjourned the case to a date to be fixed, to consider Ajil's sentence.