Several days ago, Mr. Roberts said, "To put it conservatively, our case got gutted," adding, "I spent 16 or 17 days under hostile cross-examination and then the judge limited friendly questioning by my lawyer to three or four hours."

"He would not be cognitively fit to respond to a hostile cross-examination," Dr. Albert said in his report to the judge.

In a hostile cross-examination, Republican representatives called Ms. de Young unqualified to judge the company's performance, and the drivers, the Republicans asserted, could not know larger considerations of tactics and safety behind the decisions about the trucks.

Turi is an old man and may be likely to become confused under hostile cross-examination.

Having never set foot inside a courtroom, the "lawyer for humanity" was unprepared for how little a hostile cross-examination resembled the free-ranging inquiry of the seminar.

Firmly assured, though, of the truth of my evidence, I held up creditably against hostile cross-examination by the army's lawyer.

An economist testifying on behalf of the Government in its antitrust suit against the Microsoft Corporation sat through another day of hostile cross-examination today, but Microsoft's lawyer failed to budge him from his opinions.

Mr. Shipp's testimony elicited intense and often hostile cross-examination from Carl Douglas, one of Mr. Simpson's lawyers, who sought to portray him as a celebrity groupie who was lying, perhaps to enhance his fledgling acting career.

Defense lawyers often want to avoid the risk of exposing their clients to hostile and potentially damaging cross-examination.

I had to tell her the plan, and weather her hostile cross-examination.