cut short

present singular third person cuts short · participle present cutting short

1. transitiveTo interrupt or curtail before the planned end time.

   The party was cut short because everything was getting broken.

   1 more example

   The Reggie Clemons case has been a cause of legal dispute for the past two decades. Prosecutors alleged that he and his co-defendants brutally cut short the lives of Julie and Robin Kerry, sisters who had just started college and had their whole adult lives ahead of them.

   2012 August 21, Ed Pilkington, “Death penalty on trial: should Reggie Clemons live or die?”, in The Guardian

2. transitiveTo stop someone from finishing what they are saying.

   He cut her short because he knew what she was going to say.

3. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see cut, short.

comparative cut shorter · superlative cut shortest

1. adjectiveparticipleHaving been cut short, reduced.