The Isuzu truck was travelling south in the northbound lanes of the Bruce Highway, north of Brisbane, about 10.30pm on Tuesday when it smashed head on with a Honda Accord, killing the car driver.
Police later located a Ford Ranger ute at a business in Nerangba they said was seen chasing the truck on a video filmed by people nearby.
Up to six vehicles may have been involved in chasing the truck, but abandoned their pursuit before the Ford was caught on camera.
The 42-year-old male ute driver was released without charge after questioning on Wednesday night, Detective Inspector David Harbison said.
"The investigation is ongoing. The Ford Ranger was a crime scene and has been seized by police and is undergoing forensic examination today," he said on Thursday.
"No arrests have been made at the moment and we are not expecting any in the immediate future. There is a massive brief of evidence to compile here."
Insp Harbison said the Ford Ranger driver was not following the truck at the time of the crash.
"That vehicle turned off some distance from the collision," he said.
The Honda driver, a 26-year-old Caboolture man identified in media reports as Andre Roberts, was declared dead at the scene.
"We're keeping the family in the loop with progress we are making, but of course they are naturally devastated," Det Harbison said.
The truck driver, a 46-year-old Redcliffe man, sustained life-threatening injuries and is in a critical condition in hospital.
He was allegedly involved in the theft of scrap metal, Insp Harbison said.
Multiple scrap metal dealers appear to have contacted each other by phone and text message after the truck was spotted in their area on Tuesday.
"A number of those businesses have been the subject of property crime in the past few weeks," Insp Harbison said.
"There was no break-in that night … that truck was circulating in that area and very quickly whispers got out that the truck was perhaps casing premises or was involved in property crime."
The senior detective said he didn't know the value of the stolen scrap and wouldn't speculate on whether an innocent driver died as the result of vigilante behaviour.
"It's concerned business holders obviously looking after their properties and they saw a vehicle they thought might have been involved and I can't comment on their thought process," Insp Harbison said.
"You can't put a dollar figure on someone's life. In the scheme of things it's a very minor theft of some scrap."
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