Police are looking for a 24-year-old southwest metro man who has been missing all week, after he and his girlfriend broke up.

Ryan Sauer, of Prior Lake, was last seen or heard from about 4:30 a.m. Sunday at the home where the mother of his former girlfriend lived, said Marilyn Sauer, Ryan's mother. It was shortly before that when Sauer and his girlfriend of a few months split up.

Later that morning, Marilyn Sauer said, Ryan called the girlfriend's brother and said, "See you in the next life."

"That didn't make me feel good about that," Marilyn Sauer said today. "His frame of mind wasn't good at the time. He had been out drinking earlier. So I don't think he was completely sober."

On Thursday night, Ryan Sauer was supposed to fly out to see his father in Pennsylvania, but that ticket went unused, Marilyn Sauer said.

She said her son has been clean from drug addiction since 2003 and has never been missing before.

There has been no credit card or bank account activity connected to Sauer, his mother said, and his cell phone signal hasn't been detected since Tuesday.

He has worked for the past two months installing business interiors.

Ryan Sauer is 5 feet 8 inches tall and weighs 180 pounds, with blue eyes and brown hair. He was last seen driving a 1993 red Jeep Cherokee with license plates RXX896.

He has a tattoo where his neck and back meet. It's of a rose with an arrow through it.

Anyone with information about Ryan Sauer's whereabouts is asked to call Prior Lake police at 952-445-1411.

PAUL WALSH