Abstract: 3130 cases of medicolegal postmortem in Shantou CitybetWeen January 1977 and December 1996 wereanalyzed statistically. The results revealed that the ratioof male to female was 2.3 and most dead were youngand middle age. The number of postmortem hasincreased in resent years. Of 3130 cases, 2829 (92.3%)were caused by mechanical injury, mechanical asphyxia,sudden death and poisoning.As to manners of thedeath. 1226 were related to accidents (39.2%), 776homicide(29.8%), 658 suicide (21.0%). These resultswere compared with other studies reported in domesticand international literature.

Key words: medicolegal postmortem, statistical analysis, kinds of death, manners of death