U.K. billionaire Joe Lewis, owner of Tottenham soccer team, charged with insider trading in U.S.

British billionaire and Tottenham soccer team owner Joe Lewis has been indicted in the U.S. on charges of slipping confidential business information to others, including his romantic partners and private pilots, prosecutors said Tuesday.

British billionaire and Tottenham soccer team owner Joe Lewis has been indicted in the U.S. on charges of slipping confidential business information to others, including his romantic partners and private pilots, prosecutors said Tuesday.

Manhattan-based U.S. attorney Damian Williams announced the insider trading case in a video posted on Twitter.

Williams outlined charges of "brazen" insider dealing by Lewis, saying that he exploited his entree to various corporations to reap tips that he slipped to people in his own inner circle, who deployed the knowledge to make stock trades and millions of dollars.

"As we allege, he used insider information as a way to compensate his employees and shower gifts on his friends and lovers," Williams said. "It's cheating, and it's against the law."

David M. Zornow, an attorney for Lewis, said in a statement that the "government has made an egregious error in judgment in charging Mr. Lewis, an 86-year-old man of impeccable integrity and prodigious accomplishment. Mr. Lewis has come to the US voluntarily to answer these ill-conceived charges, and we will defend him vigorously in court."

According to the indictment, Lewis' investments in various companies gave him control of board seats, where he placed associates who let him know what they learned behind the scenes. Lewis allegedly doled out that confidential information to his chosen recipients and urged them to trade on it.

At one point, according to the indictment, he even loaned his two private pilots $500,000 apiece to buy stock in a cancer-drug company that had gotten -- but not yet publicly disclosed -- encouraging results from a clinical trial.