INQUIRER: Friends of Gerald Ung, the Temple University law student charged with shooting a Villanova University graduate six times in Old City last weekend, said yesterday that he is friendly, smart, and the opposite of a troublemaker. “Gerald is not a gun-happy, overstressed law student waiting to go postal,” one friend, Ernest Apaga, said in an e-mail. “He is extraordinarily gregarious and dynamic, and there is no doubt in my mind that his friends and professors at Temple are scurrying to figure out how to get him the proper legal counseling and funding he’ll need.” The man who was shot, Eddie DiDonato Jr., 23, of Blue Bell, remained in critical condition at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, where yesterday he underwent his fourth operation since being shot in a hand, the chest, and the abdomen. DiDonato, a former captain of Villanova’s lacrosse team, is a nephew of city Republican leader Michael Meehan’s and the son of Center City lawyer Edward J. DiDonato. Ung, 28, of West Philadelphia, is charged with attempted murder and related counts. Two Facebook groups have been created by friends of each man: “Gerald Ung Is Innocent” and “Support Eddie DiDonato on His Road to Recovery.” Gina Furia Rubel, who owns a public-relations firm and as a DiDonato family friend is acting as a spokeswoman, said DiDonato’s parents had been reading him messages of support left on the Facebook site. MORE
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