A Corpus Christi man is in jail after being mistaken for a woman, being picked up by a man off the side of a busy street, and then stealing his car.

Efrain Ybarra, 18, was picked up by a man, Gerald Vega, on Tuesday afternoon at the corner of Morgan and South Staples. Vega thought Ybarra was a woman, from what he told local TV reporters and law enforcement.

The pair drove to nearby Cole Park and Vega got out of the car when Ybarra drove off in the car and crashed it into another car at an intersection after running a red light.

A Nueces County sheriff's deputy caught up with Ybarra after he fled the crash site and brought him back to the scene of the car theft, where Vega identified him as the one who stole his vehicle.

The situation gets stranger when you watch the local news video of the two sides of the story playing out in front of cameras.

Ybarra claimed Vega was attempting to rape him at the park, but Vega says Ybarra had the wrong idea. Vega insisted he didn't know that Ybarra was a man posing as a woman until he was told by reporters and police. Vega makes a few curious, aloof, statements to the cameras reminding them that he has a girlfriend, while Ybarra gets reasonably agitated with the TV camera crew.

For the sake of Vega's relationship, he probably shouldn't have said that it was "in the back of every guy's mind," when referring to sex with a strange woman. The TV reporters never designate Ybarra as transgendered, but the prostitution theory was brought up at least once, and they did note that a carjacking charge is more serious than a prostitution charge. Ybarra is referred to as a female until halfway through the piece.Ybarra remains in a Neuces County jail.