Jamie Pettingill threatened to slice up a schoolboy but should be spared jail because prisoners are certain to exploit his infamous surname, his lawyer says.
Pettingill claims he is plagued by "significant unwanted attention" more than two decades after his father, Trevor Pettingill, was acquitted of shooting two constables in the Walsh Street police murders.
His lawyer, Alex Patton, said there was a serious risk that hardened criminals would seek to capitalise on his notoriety in prison.
"Carrying his surname has bought significant unwanted attention," Mr Patton told the Victorian County Court.
"Either people seeking to ingratiate themselves with him, seeking some sort of vicarious celebrity through him.
"Or it's the polar opposite, people wanting to make a name for themselves by targeting him.
"These are real risks should he be imprisoned."
Pettingill has pleaded guilty to a series of offences including theft and threatening to inflict serious injury.
He was separately found guilty of armed robbery.
Pettingill, 24, robbed victims of their mobile phones after pleading with them to let him call his mum in a three-month theft spree in 2013.
Once he snatched the phone of an elderly woman working at a charity stall in a Broadmeadows shopping centre.
He also threatened to stab a schoolboy after taking his phone.
Lifting his shirt to reveal a knife, Pettingill told the boy, "Don't f..k with me, I'll cut your f..king face off."
Mr Patton said Pettingill had a steady job and a supportive partner and could serve his sentence in the community.
Pettingill has a crippling gambling addiction and a bereavement disorder tied to his cousin's death from a drug overdose, Mr Patton said.
But prosecutor Gary Hevey wants Pettingill jailed for preying on "soft targets".
He rejected the defence claim that the gambling addiction forced Pettingill into crime.
Judge Sandra Davis will sentence him at a later date.
Pettingill was supported in court by his mother and partner.
Trevor Pettingill, along with his half-brother Victor Peirce, Anthony Leigh Farrell and Peter David McEvoy, were charged with and later acquitted of murdering constables Steven Tynan, 22, and Damian Eyre, 20.
The two officers were shot dead early on the morning of October 12, 1988, while responding to a report of an abandoned car in South Yarra.
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