From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishwork somebody over phrasal verb informalHITto attack someone by hitting them several times → work→ See Verb table
Examples from the Corpus
work over• Still, I pestered her to distraction, trying to get her to talk to me as she went about her work.• They tied him to a chair with wire around his arms and legs, then worked him over.• We want to make a living out of it, we have to make it work.• This great work, appearing over a quarter of a century, was intended to sum up all available knowledge.• Some one was working him over but good.• She was exhausted with work and grief over her mother's early death, a mother she loved very much.• There are also times when we allow conflicts away from work to spill over into the workplace and harm our careers.• He starts to draw, working his way over the sheets with a brush and ink. 