KNOXVILLE, Tenn. - A University of Tennessee student suffered severe alcohol poisoning after taking part in a bizarre consumption method known as "butt chugging," police said.

Alexander P. Broughton, 20, of Memphis, had a blood-alcohol level of "well over" 0.40 percent after a night of drinking at the Pi Kappa Alpha house early Saturday, police said.

Broughton, who was brought to a nearby emergency room by other students, had ingested the alcohol by a method in which wine is inserted directly by a tube into a person's rectum for quick and potent absorption, police said.

"Upon extensive questioning it is believed that members of the fraternity were using rubber tubing inserted into their rectums as a conduit for alcohol as the abundance of capillaries and blood vessels present greatly heightens the level and speed of the alcohol entering the blood stream as it bypasses the filtering by the liver," Knoxville police spokesman Darrell DeBusk said in a news release.

Pi Kappa Alpha's UT chapter was administratively suspended for 30 days by Pi Kappa Alpha International, pending a decision regarding its permanent status, according to a statement from UT spokeswoman Karen Ann Simsen.

No criminal charges have been filed, although UTPD officers issued a number of citations early Saturday to young men at the fraternity, according to police records.