TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt plans to ask legislators to approve a new law he says will help prosecutors fight gang activity.

The Republican attorney general and former state senator says the recommendation for a new anti-racketeering law is a product of a gang task force he assembled in 2012.

The proposal would let prosecutors go after gangs for alleged patterns of criminal activity as well as single criminal acts. Schmidt says it would be another way to tackle what he calls the rising presence of street gangs in Kansas.

The 2013 legislative session begins Jan. 14.