The fine structure branching ratio of chlorine atoms produced in the photodissociation and predissociation of HCl was measured for excitation energies between 51 800 and 83 800 cm(-1). The branching ratio between 60 000 and 70 000 cm(-1) is in good agreement with the calculations of Alexander et al. [J. Chem. Phys, 99, 1752 (1993)], converging to the statistical limit at high energy. Predissociation of electronically excited bound states display a surprisingly rich behavior, demonstrating that the nature of the predissociating continuum state has a large effect on the atom fragment branching ratio.