The γ-decay of deep-hole states in 101, 105, 107Pd was studied via the ( 3He, αγ) reaction at E 3 he = 70 MeV and supplemented by data from 112, 118Sn targets to investigate the deep-hole spreading mechanism. The γ-decay pattern for the g 9 2 deep-hole state shows a strong dependence on the spreading width: if the deep-hole state is observed as a sharp peak, it mainly decays to the low-lying 7 2 + state by a spin-flip M1 transition with a large M1-E2 mixing ratio; if the deep-hole state is observed as a broad bump, it decays statistically indicating the complete spreading of the hole strength over the underlying states; if the deep-hole state is observed with a structure intermediate between a sharp peak and broad bump, its γ-decay shows both decay patterns. A sharp peak at E x = 2.396 MeV in 101Pd which carries a large fraction of the g 9 2 hole strength ( C 2 S = 2.0) was found to be a single state having a width of less than 2.5 keV. For the spin-flip M1 transition the destructive interference between the g 9 2 component and the coupled components of the deep-hole state was found in heavily spread states. A quasiparticle-plus-rotor (QPR) model was applied to calculate the fragmentation in the doorway stage for the g 9 2 neutron deep-hole state in the Pd isotopes. A reasonable agreement between the calculation and the experimental results was obtained for the strength fragmentation, for the nucleus 101Pd. However, the large M1-E2 mixing ratio experimentally observed was not reproduced.