Doyel: Next to Broncos, a mass murder suspect waits

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. – He's in there, and I'm wondering if he can hear the music.

It's not a silly question. I'm standing outside the Arapahoe County jail, and I can hear the music. It's coming from the Denver Broncos' practice facility next door, and that's a literal description. The practice field is next to the jail, so close that I can read the Broncos' jersey numbers – there's Peyton – as I'm touching the chain-link fence that surrounds the jail. There's razor wire at the top of the fence. I'm not touching that.

But I'm listening to whistles blowing and players yelling and then all of that stops and the loudspeakers start blaring rap. Can he hear it? You know, him?

He's in there somewhere, inside the Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office Detention Facility. His hair is no longer dyed orange, but in every picture taken of him, his eyes are wide-open spheres of insanity – and his alleged number of victims is 12. Those are the fatalities. He also allegedly wounded 70 people on July 20, 2012, when police say he walked into the Century Aurora (Colo.) 16 movie theater and set off smoke canisters before opening fire on moviegoers with two rifles and a handgun.

That was 2½ years ago. After a series of postponements, he is set to go to trial this month. Jury selection is scheduled to begin Jan. 20 at the Arapahoe County courthouse.

The courthouse is next to the jail. Which is next to the Broncos training facility.

The music is blaring, and I wonder if it brings him any sense of pleasure. I wonder if James Holmes is listening.

Four years ago, the Broncos had to evacuate their practice facility. Someone had left a car outside the jail for too long, and sheriff's deputies called the bomb squad, and the surrounding areas were cleared out. It was October 2010. Football season. And the Broncos had to evacuate their building.

That's one of the unintended, unforeseeable consequences of building a state-of-the-art practice facility in 1990 – and the Broncos' practice digs are beautiful and enormous, with multiple outdoor fields and an indoor facility and a team gift shop – next to a county jail. The 300,000 square-foot Arapahoe jail had opened three years earlier, in 1987, capable of handling 17,000 arrestees every year and at any one time accommodating 1,490 inmates.

Along with the NFL training facility on Broncos Parkway, the Dove Valley Business Park in Englewood has the jail, the courthouse and the Arapahoe County Coroner's Office. One building over – from the coroner's office, you'd head toward the Broncos facility and then make a left; you can't miss it – is where they're keeping a man accused of sending 12 bodies to the Arapahoe County coroner.

These are the thoughts I'm having as I walk inside the jail, under the sign that reads, "Inmate Visitation." Through the bulletproof glass window are 12 visible meeting rooms, each room outfitted with a phone and a video screen. How it works is, the visitor picks up a phone and the screen turns on. On the other end, an inmate is staring into the screen and holding a phone. How I know this is the woman who entered the building before me. She has a toddler in her arms, a phone against her ear, and a screen coming to life. A man inside is waiting to talk to her. Is the prisoner the woman's husband? Is the toddler his kid?

Can they hear the Broncos? Can they hear the music?

I walk outside, and I hear a man's laughter. It could be coming from the Broncos. But this being the wide open plains of Colorado, noise travels and echoes and comes back. Hard to pinpoint where it's coming from. I hear a single man laughing, and I hope to God it's coming from football practice.

The movie theater still stands. More than that, it's been renovated, reopened, recycled. On Thursday, people were walking inside at noon to watch "It Ends Here" and "Unbroken."

Walk inside, and if you didn't know, you wouldn't know. So harmless does this place seem, so … inviting, that I figured I was in the wrong place. A kid selling popcorn – his name tag identified him as Dewaun – told me that this was in fact the theater where James Holmes allegedly opened fire.

"It's been remodeled," he said.

There's not a single sign that something despicable happened here. Should there be a sign? Seems like it. Something to remember the dead, note the horror, show the strength of a community that refused to let a madman dictate where it would and would not go to enjoy life.

The theater is 10 miles from the jail where James Holmes is held. The jail is a couple of football fields from the Broncos' practice facility. And the two – the jail, the Broncos – have been linked over the years.

Hey, it happens. This is not a value judgment of the Broncos. NFL players are people just like you and me, and people like you and me get arrested from time to time. So it is with a handful of Broncos over the years, getting arrested in Arapahoe County and being admitted as an inmate at the jail right next to their football facility.

Imagine being Broncos executive Matt Russell, sentenced in May 2014 to six months of work release at the Arapahoe County jail, waking up every morning behind bars and then walking a quarter mile to the Broncos facility, then walking back to spend another night in jail.

Or imagine being Broncos star linebacker Von Miller and being arrested in August 2013 for missing a court appearance at that courthouse next to the practice facility. And being Miller and almost missing another court appearance in October 2013, before showing up two hours late. Less than two minutes from the locker room.

Or imagine three Broncos players – practice-squad safety John Boyett in 2014, tight end Richard Quinn in 2009 and tight end Byron Chamberlain in 1997 – being jailed next to the practice fields. Former Broncos offensive lineman Gerald Perry was jailed twice at the nearby facility, in 1990 and '91, and was transported by luxury sedan to the airport after his release in 1991 because he had been picked up by the Los Angeles Rams. Ex-Broncos tight end Clarence Kay, who caught 193 passes for 2,136 yards and 13 touchdowns from 1984-92, spent time in the jail in 2004 on charges of burglary and assault.

Just one of those things. The jail, right next to the football facility.

James Holmes in the jail now.

Music playing. A man laughing.

Don't ask me who's laughing. Or why. At this moment, I can't imagine finding anything funny at all.

Please find Star columnist Gregg Doyel on Twitter at @GreggDoyelStar or at www.facebook.com/gregg.doyel