The family of a dead elderly woman who earlier accused a district police station in Hunan Province of being uncooperative has agreed not to push for an autopsy.

Li Lianzhi, 80, was found hanging on a rope at about 7pm Friday inside her home in Wuling district of Changde.

Li's neighbor said that 100 police officers showed up at the village that night and removed Li's body, Ni Zhigang, a reporter with Hunan-based Xiaoxiang Morning Post, told the Global Times.

The woman was not a stranger to police since she was busy petitioning them to release her son from jail. She staged a daring protest outside the home of a county official on November 11.

Since then, the local police have had her under 24-hour surveillance, which apparently placed pressure on Li, said Li's nephew surnamed Yin.

"We can't understand why she killed herself," Yin told the Global Times Sunday.

"We are certain something unusual happened before she committed suicide," Yin said.

Yesterday, the family decided to accept the police explanation about their actions. In a statement issued yesterday by the Changde Public Security Bureau, authorities said that police officers went to Li's house that night after someone reported Li's death and they ruled it was a suicide.

The statement said local government officials asked Li's family to move the body to a public mortuary house for an immediate funeral, which the family opposed and called suspicious.

The statement, however, said that some "ill-intent" people tried to display the body in public to win public sympathy in order to pressure the police to release the woman's son from detention.

The authorities released custody of Li's body back to the family yesterday, Yin said. Yin said Li's family decided not to push for an autopsy and accepted the fact that Li died from suicide.