Be careful around there at night because thugs come out.
He hangs around with the local hoodlums.
ごろつき is an older, more general word for a ruffian, while チンピラ is the modern slangy term with a stronger connotation of youth and small-time gang bravado.
Usually written in katakana; the kanji form 破落戸 is a rare ateji spelling.
Hiragana spelling, also common.
Ateji kanji form; rarely used and may not be recognized by all readers.
The origin is uncertain. The kanji 破落戸 is ateji (characters used for their sounds, not meanings). The word may derive from mimetic or sound-symbolic elements suggesting roughness or rolling, but this is speculative.