Mother hid laptops from FBI who have since issued 17 charges against Anonymous-linked writer and former spokesman Brown

The mother of an activist with links to the Anonymous hacking group was sentenced to six months' probation on Friday, for helping her son hide laptops from the FBI.

Karen Lancaster McCutchin told a federal court in Dallas "my better judgment was clouded by my maternal instinct". The argument appeared to resonate with the judge, Paul Stickney, who said: "I feel for you, as a parent … I know you did the best you could."

McCutchin pleaded guilty earlier this year to obstructing the execution of a search warrant, prosecutors alleging that she hid two laptops belonging to her son, Barrett Brown, in a kitchen cabinet. She was also fined $1,000. McCutchin had faced a maximum sentence of 12 months in prison and a $100,000 fine.

Brown, 32, is a Dallas-based journalist who has written for publications including the Guardian and Vanity Fair. His work centres on the secretive relationships between government security agencies and private contractors. He is not a hacker but has worked with Anonymous as a de facto spokesman. The loosely-organised international hacking network has mounted a series of cyber attacks in recent years against targets including government departments and corporations.

Brown, who has previously battled with heroin addiction, has been in federal custody since September last year. He was arrested after posting tweets and YouTube videos threatening an FBI agent who had been investigating him and whom he accused of harrassing his mother.

Federal prosecutors have issued 17 charges against Brown, who has maintained his innocence. They include making threats on the internet, obstruction of justice and posting a link in a chatroom to documents hacked by Anonymous and posted on WikiLeaks containing the credit card numbers of clients of Stratfor, a private intelligence agency. Critics of his arrest have questioned whether simply sharing a link to stolen information should be considered a crime.

The charges against Brown together carry a potential prison sentence of more than 100 years. By contrast, Jeremy Hammond, the hacktivist who released emails from the global intelligence company Stratfor, is facing up to 10 years in prison.