Phillip Stretch, an associate of Lewis Popata, was jailed in 2001 for killing a passenger in a crash.

A man involved in a fatal police pursuit near Nelson had previously killed a person in a booze-fuelled smash and was wanted for dishonesty-related offending.

Phillip Stretch, 33, was a passenger in a car that crashed during a police chase, killing the two occupants and an innocent motorist on State Highway 6 at Hope, south of Nelson about 5.40am on Sunday.

It's understood Stretch was wanted for dishonesty-related offending, believed to be burglary. Both he and the driver of the offending vehicle, Johnathan Tairakena, 25, were well-known criminals and disqualified from driving.

STUFF Phillip Stretch was killed in the crash on Sunday.

The woman in the other car was 53-year-old Carmen Marie Yanko.

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Tasman district commander Superintendent Mike Johnson said the chase happened after police tried to stop a vehicle while looking for a wanted person on Gladstone Rd in Richmond.

FACEBOOK Johnathan Tairakena was killed in the crash near Nelson.

The vehicle kept going, overtook a truck, moved onto the wrong side of the road, and collided with a vehicle travelling north, he said.

"Tragically three people have died as a result, two of the deceased were from the fleeing vehicle and the third person was an innocent member of the public," Johnson said.

Stretch was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison at the age of 17, after killing a passenger in a crash in 2001.

LUZ ZUNIGA/STUFF Yanko died on her way to Nelson's Sunday market, where she had a regular stall.

He pleaded guilty to 14 charges – five of the charges, including drink-driving causing death, resulted from the crash that killed Jamie Kelly, 19.

Kelly was one of four passengers in a car being driven by Stretch, who crashed after losing control on a bend at Mariri​, near Motueka, on May 31, 2001. The car left the road and rolled twice before landing on its roof in mudflats 80 metres away.

Kelly, a back seat passenger, was thrown from the car and landed in the estuary. She suffered head and chest injuries and died within minutes, but her body was not found until the next day.

Police estimated Stretch was driving between 130kmh and 140kmh. He was drinking bourbon as he drove and had six times the legal limit of alcohol in his system.

Stretch was jailed again in 2003, for eight months, after driving while disqualified, unlawfully taking two motor vehicles and theft while on parole. The court heard Stretch was intoxicated when he stole one of the cars in December 2002. He entered a property and got into a truck, which was unlocked and had the keys in the ignition. Stretch drove off in the truck, but stopped a short distance away when the engine failed.

On Boxing Day 2002, he stole a car from a house in Hill View Rd, Takaka, and drove around the Tasman town. He then went to a house on Abel Tasman Drive and stole an aluminium tin with $80 cash and various personal cards in it.

Tairakena was jailed for six months in 2010 for a string of burglary and theft offences. The then 17-year-old admitted two charges of burglary, and charges of theft, wilful damage and theft from a vehicle. The offending included the theft of of $2400 worth of electronic equipment and CDs from a home, and a small amount of cash from a charity donation tin at McDonald's.

Johnson was also unable to confirm details about the crash that killed Tairakena, Stretch and a third person on Sunday, but said police had been seeking the "particular person we were looking for, for a period of time".

Police had pursued the car for about 6 kilometres and were still chasing the fleeing driver when the crash happened. The incident would be investigated internally and the Independent Police Conduct Authority had been formally notified.

Johnson said it was too early to say whether police made the right call in pursuing the vehicle and he would not comment on whether pursuits should be carried out at all.

He said police had "very stringent procedures" that governed when they did, and did not, pursue vehicles.

"These are high-risk, high-impact events, I would ask that people when signalled by police to stop, pull over and let us conduct whatever business is required at that point," he said.

The families affected were being supported by police. All three victims were from the Nelson-Tasman area.