WAGRAM — Malcolm Pfeiffer-El grew up speaking both English and German and has since learned two more languages. The 40-year-old’s fourth language and his love for music led him to being the 51st person to be certified by the Library of Congress in Braille Music transcription.
Pfeiffer-El, Offender No. 0555827, is serving life in prison at Scotland Correctional Institution in Laurinburg for the first-degree murder of Christopher Wayne McLamb in Benson on Dec. 12, 1996.
“When I arrived here at this institution, I was housed with some guys who were in the Braille program,” Pfeiffer-El said. “And I was just interested in the Braille program because I’ve seen it as an opportunity to learn something that I can use when I get out in society.”
“If you have time, take advantage of your time. That’s what I strive to do and these guys strive to do.”
The Braille program at the Scotland County facility is part of Correction Enterprises, a self-sufficient entity within the North Carolina Department of Public Safety that operates 31 plants in 25 of the state’s 51 prisons.
The training programs at the plants vary, said Karen Brown, who has been director of Correction Enterprises for 15 years. There are several sewing plants, road sign-making facilities, a farm, printing operations, eyeglass manufacturing, furniture making, and more.
Not all of the programs operate in the black for Correction Enterprises, which receives no state money. On top of paying its approximately 2,700 inmates, the organization is responsible for paying out $6.5 million in other allocations outside of its operations.
Pfeiffer-El is one of just 22 in the Braille translation program and makes the highest hourly rate — 28 cents an hour. Every inmate with Correction Enterprises can earn bonuses but can make a maximum of $21 a week.
It’s the training and soft skills inmates like Pfeiffer-El receive with Correction Enterprises that represent the value.
“They don’t know how to talk to a supervisor, they don’t know how to interview, they don’t know how to present themselves, they don’t know how to talk about what skills they do have, they don’t know how to communicate, they don’t know how to work in teams,” Brown said. “There’s none of that when they’re coming to us. So we start with the very basics.”
The Braille translation room looks much like any cubicle-filled office space, and it’s easy to forget the five men working to translate Braille under the supervision of petite, middle-aged Correction Enterprises Braille supervisor Cindy Stubbs are anything other than normal 9-to-5 employees. Two correction officers check in on occasion, but are down the hall overseeing several vocational rooms.
“To be able to come down here every day is an honor, it’s a blessing. So we don’t want to do anything that’s going to put that in jeopardy,” Pfeiffer-El said. “So the guys that come down here really want to make sure they’re the best examples, because we don’t want anything to look bad on our supervisors as well, or even with the quality of work we send out.”
The other 17 inmates who train in Braille are not there due to a Christmastime prisonwide lockdown that was slowly loosening in mid-January — a reminder of the realities of prison.
Stubbs herself was incarcerated for 14 years in South Carolina, but was hired upon release by Correction Enterprises to teach Braille after she showed an aptitude for it while serving time.
Pfeiffer-El, who also learned Spanish in prison prior to joining Correction Enterprises’ Braille program three-and-a-half years ago, is one of Stubbs’ prized trainees. Mention of Pfeiffer-El’s certification in Braille music translation leads her to peacock that he aced his test with a 97.
“First time,” she said proudly.
Pfeiffer-El learned several instruments in his youth — clarinet, bass clarinet, bass drum, and some piano and violin — and applies that aptitude to translating music into Braille.
“You need to have a background in music because you need to understand how the music is played,” Pfeiffer-El said. “Because the blind student can’t play and feel the Braille. They have to memorize everything that’s on that sheet of paper before they can actually play it, and it has to be precise.”
Stubbs said she made it through seven of the 32 Braille music lessons before her lack of musical talent caught up to her and she stalled.
Still, she’s an inspiration for the inmates she teaches — proof that dedication can prepare one for life after prison. Brown said Braille has the lowest recidivism rate of any correctional industry in which one can be trained — only 2 percent of those released return to prison.
Convicted of murder months after his 20th birthday, Pfeiffer-El is more than two decades into his sentence and has earned advanced college degrees and now two languages.
He’s a model prisoner — his record shows just one infraction from 2007 — but the reality is he still committed a brutal crime and is serving his time.
“I’m on a life sentence right now, 21 years on my life sentence,” Pfeiffer-El said. “So in possibly four years I’ll be brought up for review.”
Brown and Stubbs are doing everything they can to prepare him in case he does get out.
And so is Pfeiffer-El.