Premier League club owner charged with 'brazen' inside trading

It's alleged Lewis passed these details on to friends, his personal pilots, assistants and even romantic partners.

The Tottenham owner faces a 19-count indictment with 16 counts of securities fraud and three counts of conspiracy.

“We allege that for years Joe Lewis abused his access to corporate boardrooms and repeatedly provided inside information to his romantic partners, his personal assistants, his private pilots and his friends,” a statement from Williams said.

“Those folks then traded on that inside information and made millions of dollars in the stock market, because thanks to Lewis those bets were a sure thing.

“None of this was necessary, Joe Lewis was a wealthy man.

“But as we allege he used inside information as a way to compensate his employees or shower gifts on his friends and lovers.”

Prosecutors also claim Lewis lent money to those he tipped off.

It's alleged that, in October 2019, he wired the sum of $1m to two pilots so they could buy shares in biotech company Mirati.

One pilot is said to have texted a friend saying: "Boss lent Marty and I $500,000 each for this."

The same pilot also reportedly claimed 'the Boss has inside info', too.

Both pilots allegedly repaid their loans soon after Mirati announced positive results from a clinical trial.

This saw its stock price rise to 16.7 per cent.

Williams has charged Lewis with 'classic corporate corruption'.

And he also said the Tottenham supremo would face justice in the courts of New York.

Bloomberg state the Spurs owner has a net worth of £5bn, with his wealth tied to Bahamas-based holding company Tavistock.

Lewis has made most of his money from currency trading and denies the charges.

And he took charge of Tottenham in the 1990s, though the club have struggled to win trophies in the years since.

Earlier in the week, it was reported that Lewis had instructed Tottenham chief Daniel Levy to sell Harry Kane.

Kane's future is up in the air amid transfer interest from the likes of Manchester United and Bayern Munich.

As things stand, his contract is due to expire next summer.

Levy has, to this point, refused to let Kane leave the club and is willing to run the risk of his talisman jumping ship for nothing in 12 months' time.

But Lewis would prefer for Spurs to receive a fee for the England international, who has established himself as one of the deadliest forwards in the Premier League over the past decade.