If a pipeline step "checkout scm" on a build fails midway through an SVN checkout, files within the working directory are kept open by the jenkins process and later builds on the same host fail because the old workspace cannot be fully deleted.

The original SVN failure looks like (with hostname scubbed):

ERROR: Failed to check out https://host.example.com/svn/project/trunk
org.tmatesoft.svn.core.SVNException: svn: E175002: Connection reset
svn: E175002: REPORT request failed on '/svn/!svn/vcc/default'
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.wc.SVNErrorManager.error(SVNErrorManager.java:112)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.wc.SVNErrorManager.error(SVNErrorManager.java:96)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.io.dav.http.HTTPConnection.request(HTTPConnection.java:765)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.io.dav.http.HTTPConnection.request(HTTPConnection.java:352)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.io.dav.http.HTTPConnection.request(HTTPConnection.java:340)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.io.dav.DAVConnection.performHttpRequest(DAVConnection.java:910)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.io.dav.DAVConnection.doReport(DAVConnection.java:363)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.io.dav.DAVRepository.runReport(DAVRepository.java:1349)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.io.dav.DAVRepository.update(DAVRepository.java:847)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.wc2.ng.SvnNgAbstractUpdate.updateInternal(SvnNgAbstractUpdate.java:263)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.wc2.ng.SvnNgAbstractUpdate.update(SvnNgAbstractUpdate.java:115)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.wc2.ng.SvnNgAbstractUpdate.checkout(SvnNgAbstractUpdate.java:877)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.wc2.ng.SvnNgCheckout.run(SvnNgCheckout.java:26)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.wc2.ng.SvnNgCheckout.run(SvnNgCheckout.java:11)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.wc2.ng.SvnNgOperationRunner.run(SvnNgOperationRunner.java:20)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.internal.wc2.SvnOperationRunner.run(SvnOperationRunner.java:21)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.wc2.SvnOperationFactory.run(SvnOperationFactory.java:1239)
at org.tmatesoft.svn.core.wc2.SvnOperation.run(SvnOperation.java:294)
at hudson.scm.subversion.CheckoutUpdater$SubversionUpdateTask.perform(CheckoutUpdater.java:133)
at hudson.scm.subversion.WorkspaceUpdater$UpdateTask.delegateTo(WorkspaceUpdater.java:168)
at hudson.scm.subversion.WorkspaceUpdater$UpdateTask.delegateTo(WorkspaceUpdater.java:176)
at hudson.scm.subversion.UpdateUpdater$TaskImpl.perform(UpdateUpdater.java:134)
at hudson.scm.subversion.WorkspaceUpdater$UpdateTask.delegateTo(WorkspaceUpdater.java:168)
at hudson.scm.SubversionSCM$CheckOutTask.perform(SubversionSCM.java:1041)
at hudson.scm.SubversionSCM$CheckOutTask.invoke(SubversionSCM.java:1017)
at hudson.scm.SubversionSCM$CheckOutTask.invoke(SubversionSCM.java:990)
at hudson.FilePath$FileCallableWrapper.call(FilePath.java:3086)
at hudson.remoting.UserRequest.perform(UserRequest.java:212)
at hudson.remoting.UserRequest.perform(UserRequest.java:54)
at hudson.remoting.Request$2.run(Request.java:369)
at hudson.remoting.InterceptingExecutorService$1.call(InterceptingExecutorService.java:72)
at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask.run(Unknown Source)
at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor.runWorker(Unknown Source)
at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(Unknown Source)
at hudson.remoting.Engine$1.lambda$newThread$0(Engine.java:93)
at java.lang.Thread.run(Unknown Source)

with the later failure looking like:

[WS-CLEANUP] Deleting project workspace...
[WS-CLEANUP] Deferred wipeout is used...
ERROR: Cannot delete workspace :Unable to delete 'c:\jenkins\workspace\project\.svn\svn.da1e85c5-6901-0010-a2aa-8db97d3cc16d.tmp'. Tried 3 times (of a maximum of 3) waiting 0.1 sec between attempts.