Carry Me Home

Jake Kovco was the first Australian soldier to die in Iraq: killed by a single shot to the head from his own Army-issued pistol. Shockingly, his body went missing, and the corpse of a Bosnian carpenter was brought home in his place.

Nothing about Private Kovcos death or the events that followed was simple: evidence from the scene of his death was lost, the Military Police re-wrote witness statements, his funeral became a political event, the family dismissed the military inquiry as a cover-up and the subsequent coronial inquest unearthed painful truths no mother should have to hear about her son.

Carry Me Home is the compelling inside story of Jake, the man and the soldier, including the two year investigation into his mysterious death and the systematic failure of our military bureaucracy to adequately respond. cy that was known to be failing long before Jake left for Iraq.

Thought-provoking, detailed and gripping, Carry Me Home provides the inside story of the two-year investigation into Jake's death. In doing so, it exposes the dark underbelly of the military establishment that has become one of the fundamental components of Australia's idea of itself.