ANN ARBOR – A University of Michigan engineering student died Nov. 13 morning after celebrating his 21st birthday with at least 20 shots of Scotch whiskey.
Byung Soo Kim consumed the alcohol in only 10 minutes at a party that started
Friday (Nov. 10) night, police said. He was blue and unconscious when he was found early Nov. 11 morning in an apartment. A second man who was unconscious was recovering.
Kim died at 6 a.m. Nov. 13 at the University of Michigan Medical Center, a hospital spokeswoman said.
His blood alcohol level was nearly four times the legal level of drunkenness when he was admitted to the hospital, police said.
His parents, who live in Seoul, South Korea flew to Michigan on Nov. 12 afternoon. His parents, both medical doctors, had spent a year in Ann Arbor in 1989 as visiting scholars, family friends told The Ann Arbor News.
After graduating from high school in Virginia, Kim decided to attend the University of Michigan.
Friday (Nov. 10) night was supposed to be a party for Kim, where 11 friends gathered in an apartment building to celebrate his 21st birthday. Ann Arbor police said Kim was trying to down a shot for every year of his life, but passed out after the 20th shot.
His friends told investigators they put him in the back bedroom and when they checked on him an hour later, they discovered he was not breathing, police said.
At the hospital, several hours after drinking the shots, Kim’s blood alcohol level registered 0.39. That’s nearly four times the level of what’s considered legally drunk, 0.10.
A police officer said that it appears that Kim purchased the whiskey himself, and police were trying to determine if everyone in the apartment was over 21. But,he said, any further criminal investigation is unlikely.
"If he was 20, there would be a lot more to investigate," The police officer told the Ann Arbor paper. "Since he’s 21 and allegedly made the purchase legally himself, there’s no crime in what occurred."
Frank Cianciola, interim associate vice president of student affairs and dean of students, spent much of the weekend at the hospital. He said the death touched the university’s Korean community deeply. Kim was in his first year in the College of Engineering, he said.
"This type of drinking is not about being a young adult or a rite of passage. Students need to understand that it can be life-altering and it has repercussions on the entire community," Cianciola said.