Ten years after Smuckers the mutt dug up a soldier’s Purple Heart in the backyard of her owners’ home in Denver’s Park Hill neighborhood, the medal is finally heading back to the family it belongs to.

Army Cpl. Richmond L. Litman’s medal, earned when he was wounded in South Korea in 1950, was claimed by his stepdaughter on Sunday night after she saw news reports about the Purple Heart’s discovery and a search for the family it’s connected to — her family.

Smuckers, a yellow Lab mix, dug up the medal in 2005. The owners, who have since moved, recently learned of Purple Hearts Reunited, a Vermont-based group that reunites the medals with the warriors who earned them.

Purple Hearts Reunited determined Litman, a Korean War veteran, died in 1990 and is buried with his wife, Ida, at Fort Logan National Cemetery.

The organization and the homeowners where the medal was found had been unable to find Litman’s family until the soldier’s daughter came forward over the weekend.

“She saw a couple of the newscasts (Sunday) night and called me at about midnight,” the organization’s founder, Zachariah Fike, said. “It worked out exactly how we planned.”

The organization plans to let Smuckers himself return the medal to Litman’s daughter at a ceremony within the next week.

As to how the medal found its way into the backyard?

“She’s not really sure,” Fike said of the daughter. “She is going to talk to family to put together the pieces of the puzzle.”

The daughter told Fike that Litman’s family had lived about a block away from where the Purple Heart was found and she also lives not far from there.

“I’m glad to see it back with the family,” said Steve Jankousky, who owns the now-11-year-old Smuckers.

“I’m glad we didn’t lose it in the move,” he said. “I’m happy that Smuckers likes to dig holes.”

Jesse Paul: 303-954-1733, jpaul@denverpost.com or twitter.com/JesseAPaul

The Associated Press contributed to this report